Keith Olsen
born 1957 Denver
After musical studies in San Francisco, Knoxville, New York and Baden-Baden, Olsen made his debut in Die lustige Witwe at the
New York City Opera (1982), where he stayed for the next few years, singing a lot of Mozart, but also Gounod's Faust. Guest appearances:
Boston, Cincinnati, Seattle.
From 1987, he sang primarily in Europe, initially with a resident contract in Karlsruhe, where he made his debut as Rodolfo. Before long,
he appeared in Hamburg, Hannover, Frankfurt, Leipzig, Düsseldorf and Duisburg, Aachen, Montpellier, San Francisco, at the Berlin
Staatsoper, in Toronto, Los Angeles, Bonn. From 1993, he sang frequently in Italy: Torino, Bologna, Arena di Verona, Palermo, Rome; plus
he was hired by Covent Garden, Deutsche Oper Berlin and the Théâtre du Capitole in Toulouse. He had a large repertory, from
Don Ottavio and Tamino to Pollione, from Lenskij to Calaf, from Edgardo to Don José, from Flamand (Capriccio) to Boris in
Káťa Kabanová, from Massenet's des Grieux to Radamès. His career lasted roughly 25 years, and in the
end, he arrived at singing Canio or Otello, having considerably enlarged the volume of his originally very small voice. Beautiful timbre,
quite captivating interpreter, so-so singer prone to pushing.
Reference 1: Kutsch & Riemens; reference 2
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