Opera Scotland

Ronald Dowd Suggest updates

Born Sydney, 23 February 1914.
Died Sydney, 15 March 1990.

Australian tenor.

Ronald Dowd played an important role in British operatic life for fifteen years, during which he gave great dramatic authority to a group of heroic tenor parts for which his powerful voice and fiery temperamemt completely suited him. Beginning his career in Australia, he first appeared as Hoffmann in Perth (1948), before singing some twenty roles in Sydney and Melbourne. These included Alfredo, Lensky, Lohengrin, Rodolfo, Cavaradossi, Faust, Canio, and the Poet in Arthur Benjamin’s The Devil Take Her.

He came to Britain in 1954 and his debut with Sadler’s Wells in 1956 was as Canio. He sang a wide range of dramatic tenor roles there, including Hugh the Drover, Pinkerton, Cavaradossi, Florestan, Samson, Tannhäuser, Jimmy Mahoney, and the Witch in Hansel and Gretel. He was particularly noted for his Oedipus Rex, Idomeneo and Peter Grimes. He worked with the Royal Opera as Canio, Grimes, Aeneas, and the Drum Major. In Hamburg he created Claudius in Hamlet (Searle 1967), repeated the following year at Covent Garden. With WNO he sang Cavaradossi. For Scottish Opera his range included Otello (1964), Aeneas (1969) and Florestan (1970). He also sang Aeneas with Colin Davis in concert at the Royal Albert Hall.

He returned to live in Australia in 1972, where his roles included Pierre in War and Peace for the opening of the Sydney Opera House, as well as repeating Florestan.