Opera Scotland

Ashley Riches Suggest updates

English baritone.

Ashley Riches studied English at Cambridge University, where he was a member of the King's College Chapel Choir under Stephen Cleobury. He went on to study Opera at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and is now a member of the Jette Parker Young Artists programme at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden.

Operatic appearances include the title roles in Eugene Onegin and Don Giovanni, both Marcello and Schaunard La Bohème, Aeneas Dido and Aeneas, Father Hansel and Gretel, Tarquinius The Rape of Lucretia, Sid Albert Herring, Demetrius A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and Ibn-Hakia in Tchaikovsky's Iolanta. He sang the roles of Drunken Poet, Winter, Corydon and Sleep in The Fairy Queen with Paul McCreesh and the Gabrieli Consort in Spitalfields, Madrid and Beaune.

In November 2012 he made his debut at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden singing with Roberto Alagna in a Gala Concert, and appeared as Salieri in Rimsky Korsakov’s Mozart and Salieri with the Jette Parker Young Artists at the Linbury Studio Theatre, Covent Garden. His Scottish operatic debut is as Claudio in Berlioz's Beatrice and Benedict with Robin Ticciati and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra.

Concert appearances include the Mozart Requiem with David Hill and the Bach Choir in the Royal Festival Hall; Beethoven's 9th Symphony and the Brahms German Requiem with Stephen Cleobury; the Fauré Requiem with Sir David Willcocks; and Vaughan Williams' Five Mystical Songs with John Rutter. He sang Bach Cantatas with the AAM and Richard Egarr at the Wigmore Hall and Handel’s Israel in Egypt at Dartington with Jonathan Cohen, as well as Messiah in Symphony Hall, Birmingham. His appearance in Beethoven's Missa Solemnis was conducted by Sir Roger Norrington. Large-scale concert events extend to the Verdi Requiem in Winchester Cathedral and the Royal Albert Hall, as well as Belshazzar’s Feast in the Royal Festival Hall.

He has given song recitals at Barbican Hall, the City of London Festival, and the Chelsea Schubert Festival.  He has appeared at the Ludlow English Song Festival with Iain Burnside and given an evening of Britten and Fauré at the Wigmore Hall. Hyperion has recorded him in the Poulenc Chansons Gaillardes with Graham Johnson. In 2013 he sang several Handel arias for a David Starkey TV series “Music and Monarchy” with the AAM and Richard Egarr. With them he also recorded the St John Passion.

Appearances on the continent include Britten's War Requiem with Jan Latham-Koenig and Novaya Opera, Moscow.