Opera Scotland

Otoniel Gonzaga Suggest updates

Born Jaro, Iloilo City.

Filipino tenor.

Otoniel Gonzaga studied at the Ottawa University in Kansas. After a short period as a teacher he won a scholarship to the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia.

While still a student he won first prize in the 1968 Marian Anderson Singing Competition in Philadelphia and appeared at the Marlboro Music Festival in Vermont with Pablo Casals. He also sang with the Philadelphia Orchestra under the direction of Eugene Ormandy.

In 1972 he was one of the three prize winners at the Munich International Singing Competition and in the following autumn joined the Trier Opera House, remaining on contract with the company for four years singing twenty major roles. In 1977 he moved to the company at Augsburg and later to the Frankfurt Opera.

Guest appearances took him to several other German houses - Munich, Hamburg, Stuttgart, Düsseldorf, West Berlin (Deutsche Oper) and East Berlin (both Staatsoper and Komische Oper). He also worked in Zurich, Berne, Ghent, Barcelona and Metz, while returning to the USA to sing at Philadelphia and the Boston Opera.

He appeared regularly on German and American television and also had a wide concert and oratorio repertoire.