Biography

Robin Blaze began to emerge as a leading counter-tenor late in the 1990s. In common with most singers of his voice type, he is primarily a specialist in early music, especially Baroque and Classical era opera. His father was a professional golfer, instilling in Blaze a love for that game he still pursues despite his increasingly busy concert and operatic schedule. Blaze studied music at Oxford's Magdalen College. He then won a scholarship from the Countess of Munster Trust to pursue post-graduate studies at the Royal College of Music. He has since joined the faculty of the Royal College. Britain's Classic CD magazine described his greatest assets as a crystal-clear tone and an exceptional ability at phrasing, enabling him to treat words with special sensitivity. These and other attributes have led him to a starring position in the world of early music interpretation. He has appeared at the Boston Early Music Festival and other major early music festivals in Beaune, Karlsruhe, Utrecht, Jerusalem, Barossa Valley, and Saintes. Some of the ensembles with which he has performed are the Sixteen, Oxford Camerata, I Fagiolini, Fretwork, Robert King and King's Consort, Collegium Vocale Ghent, the Dufay Collective, the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, Tafelmusik, the English Concert, and the Academy of Ancient Music. His Boston Early Music Festival performance was in its acclaimed production of Purcell's King Arthur. Blaze has also sung the part of the God of Dreams in Purcell's Indian Queen (at Schwetzingen and Queen Elizabeth Hall), Narciso in Handel's Agrippina (Karlsruhe), Unulfo in Handel's Rodelinda (Broomhill Opera Festival), and Anfinomo in Monteverdi's Il ritorno d'Ulisse in Patria (Teatro San Carlos of Lisbon). He is also active as a recital and concert singer and in the recording studio. He has made discs for Naxos, Harmonia Mundi, Hyperion, BIS, Deutsche Grammophon, and Virgin Classics. Among his records are a set of German Baroque cantatas, several sets of Bach cantatas (for both BIS and DG), English lute songs with Elizabeth Kenny, Vivaldi's Stabat Mater, a program of music by Purcell and Blow with René Jacobs, Boyce's Peleus and Thetis, and sets of anthems by Blow (Hyperion) and Gibbons (Naxos). His recording debut was in 1981, when he was a boy treble, an issue that is now out of print.