American bass David Leigh, a graduate of the Metropolitan Opera’s Lindemann Young Artist Development Program, has been described by Opera News as “a bass of unusual agility, depth and darkness” and is internationally known for his visceral and intelligent singing. In the 2024–25 season, Leigh debuts at the Opéra national de Paris as Virgilio in Pascal Dusapin’s world premiere production of Il Viaggio, Dante, conducted by Kent Nagano and Rocco in Fidelio with Washington National Opera; in concert, he makes two appearances with the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, both with Semyon Bychkov, first in Janáček’s Glagolitic Mass on tour in Karlovy Vary and at Carnegie Hall, and then Pater Profundus in Mahler’s Symphony No. 8 as part of the Prague Spring Festival, which will later be released as a recording. Elsewhere, he joins the Rochester Philharmonic for Mozart’s Requiem and the Nashville Symphony for Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9, and he presents a solo concert with Minnesota Opera.
In the 2023–24 season, David Leigh returned to Opernhaus Zürich for Hagen in Götterdämmerung, a role he repeated later in the season as part of the complete Ring cycles, including Fafner in Siegfried, as well as Commendatore in Don Giovanni with the Canadian Opera Company. In concert, he performed as Hagen in Act III of Götterdämmerung with Andris Nelsons and the Boston Symphony Orchestra.
David Leigh comes from a family of artists: his father, Mitch Leigh, was the Tony-winning composer of Man of La Mancha; his mother, Abby Leigh, is an American painter whose work is in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum and the Whitney, among others; and his sister, Eve Leigh, is a multiple award-winning playwright. He studied music composition at Yale University and holds master’s degrees in Voice and Opera from Mannes College and the Yale School of Music, respectively; at Yale he also received the Harriet Gibbs Fox Prize. He has received awards from the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, the McCammon Competition at Fort Worth Opera, the New York Foundation for the Arts, and a 2017 top prize from the Wagner Society of New York.