Rod Gilfry

Rod Gilfry is an American operatic baritone and Broadway performer born on March 11, 1959, in Covina, California, who grew up in West Covina and Claremont. He earned a bachelor's degree in music education from Cal State Fullerton and a master's degree in voice from the Thornton School of Music at the University of Southern California. His vocal training included study at the Music Academy of the West under Martial Singher, with whom he also worked privately for six years. In 1999 he pursued additional technical study in Manhattan with Armen Boyajian, whose other students include Samuel Ramey and Gerald Finley.

Gilfry made his operatic debut in a comprimario role in Otello at Los Angeles Opera in 1986, and the following year began a seven-year tenure as a principal baritone at Frankfurt Opera and Zurich Opera. Upon returning to the United States, he performed at major houses including the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Dallas Opera, San Diego Opera, and Los Angeles Opera. His Metropolitan Opera debut came on November 25, 1996, when he sang Demetrius in the company's premiere of Britten's A Midsummer Night's Dream, a role he performed eight times that season. He returned to the Met in the 2000–2001 season for six performances as Marcello in Puccini's La bohème and six as Guglielmo in Mozart's Così fan tutte.

Recognized as a Mozart specialist, Gilfry has performed the roles of Don Giovanni, Count Almaviva, Guglielmo, and Papageno, alongside a broader baritone repertoire that includes Pelléas, Valentin, Orestes, Belcore, and Billy Budd. He became particularly associated with new opera, originating a substantial number of roles at prominent institutions. Among the most notable was Stanley Kowalski in André Previn's A Streetcar Named Desire, which premiered at San Francisco Opera in 1998. He created the role of Nathan in Nicholas Maw's Sophie's Choice at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden in 2002, and originated the role of Tsar Nicholas in Drattell's Nicholas and Alexandra at Los Angeles Opera in 2003. During the 2005–2006 season he portrayed plantation owner Edward Gaines in Margaret Garner at Opera Philadelphia, Cincinnati Opera, and Michigan Opera Theatre. In August 2006 he sang Prospero in Thomas Adès's The Tempest at Santa Fe Opera, and in November 2006 he created the role of Jack London in Libby Larsen's Every Man Jack for Sonoma City Opera. In 2008 he sang the principal role of Falke on a Japanese tour of Die Fledermaus and the title role in a Dutch/British production of Messiaen's Saint François d'Assise. At Zurich Opera he performed the role of the composer in Richard Strauss's Intermezzo, conducted by Peter Schneider and staged by Jens-Daniel Herzog, with Christiane Kohl as Christine. In February 2020 he created the role of Eurydice's father in the world premiere of Matthew Aucoin's Eurydice, with a libretto by Sarah Ruhl, at Los Angeles Opera. Gilfry has appeared on twenty-five recordings, including a 1995 Don Giovanni that received a Grammy nomination.

Alongside his opera career, Gilfry developed a parallel presence in musical theatre. His interest in the form dates to a high school production of Li'l Abner. He subsequently performed Curly in Oklahoma!, Billy Bigelow in Carousel, and Joe in The Most Happy Fella, all in Los Angeles, and played Robert in the City Center Encores! production of The New Moon in New York, a role he also recorded. His Broadway credit came in 2009, when he appeared in South Pacific. That same year he starred as Lancelot opposite Sylvia McNair's Guenevere in a concert version of Camelot at the Ravinia Festival. In the summer of 2011 he played Frank Butler opposite Deborah Voigt's Annie Oakley in Annie Get Your Gun at the Glimmerglass Festival in Cooperstown, New York, in a production directed by Francesca Zambello. In June 2012 he portrayed Sweeney Todd at the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis in a production directed by Ron Daniels and conducted by Stephen Lord, reprising a role he had previously performed at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris under conductor David Charles Abell, with Caroline O'Connor as Mrs. Lovett. On August 22, 2010, he appeared at the Royal Albert Hall alongside Kim Criswell in a BBC Prom devoted to the music of Rodgers and Hammerstein, broadcast on the BBC on August 28, 2010.

In collaboration with actor and director Charles Nelson Reilly, Gilfry developed a one-man cabaret show, which he has toured alongside his opera and musical theatre engagements and released as both a DVD and an enhanced CD. He was featured as himself in a 2004 episode of the PBS children's television program Arthur, titled "Lights, Camera... Opera!," in which he performs the role of Escamillo from Carmen. Gilfry shortened his performing name from Rodney to Rod in 2005. He is married with three children and lives in suburban Los Angeles. His daughter Carin is an opera singer, and his son Marc is a member of the band Neil Frances.