IestynDavies

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Countertenor
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Nicholas Moloney

Nicholas Moloney

Senior Artist Manager

Representation

Worldwide general management with Askonas Holt

About Iestyn

An esteemed interpreter of Handel, Iestyn Davies begins the 24/25 season singing Didymus in Theodora at Teatro Real Madrid and with Music of the Baroque, Chicago; before delving into other works by the composer including David in Saul at the Glyndebourne Festival; Il Trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno and Dixit Dominus with the Los Angeles Philharmonic and Emmanuelle Haim, Messiah with les Violons du Roy and Bernard Labadie, and arias on tour with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe and Robin Ticciati.

In other repertoire, Iestyn will tour Monteverdi's Poppea with Cappella Mediterranea and Leonardo Garcia Alracon in Europe, and J.C. Bach, Scheidt, Schein, Buxtehude and more with Fretwork in the U.S. and Canada.

In recent seasons, he sang Bertarido in Rodelinda on tour in the U.S.A. and Asia with Harry Bicket and The English Concert, made his role debut at the Paris Opera as Tolomeo in Giulio Cesare, sang Oberon in Britten's A Midsummer Night's Dream with Atlanta Opera and at Garsington Opera, and the Boy in George Benjamin's Written on Skin with the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra. In August, he made his Australian debut singing J.S. Bach and Arvo Pärt in an extensive solo tour with the Australian Chamber Orchestra.

Iestyn appeared for a season on Broadway in a revival of his West-End theatre project Farinelli and the King with Mark Rylance, which received an Olivier Award nomination. Fascinated by blending traditional theatre with musical performance, Iestyn has also developed a new work with director Netia Jones, An Anatomy of Melancholy: an exploration of John Dowland’s impactful melodies and Robert Burton’s 17th-century treatise on the philosophy, scholarship, and cures for a melancholic affliction.

A celebrated recitalist with repertoire ranging from Dowland to Clapton, he has twice been awarded the Gramophone Recital Award. In 2017, he won the Gramophone Baroque Vocal Award and was awarded an MBE by the Queen for his services to Music.

Iestyn is based in London

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Representation

Worldwide general management with Askonas Holt

Season Highlights

Nov 2024 - Nov 2024
Teatro Real Madrid
Handel Theodora (Didymus) Ivor Bolton (conductor)
Nov 2024 - Dec 2024
U.S.A. and Canada tour
J.C. Bach, Tunder, Scheidt, Schein, Buxtehude and more Fretwork
Dec 2024 - Dec 2024
Palais Montcalm, Quebec
Handel Messiah Bernard Labadie (conductor) Les Violons du Roy

Selected Repertoire

AdèsThe Exterminating Angel (Francisco)   •   The Tempest (Trinculo)
BenjaminWritten on Skin (First Angel/Boy)
BrittenA Midsummer Night's Dream (Oberon)
GluckOrfeo ed Euridice (Orfeo)
HandelAgrippina (Ottone)   •   Ariodante (Polinesso)   •   Cesare (Cesare, Tolomeo)   •   Jephtha (Hamor)   •   L'incoronazione di Poppea (Ottone)   •   Partenope (Arsace)   •   Rinaldo (title role)   •   Rodelinda (Bertarido)   •   Saul (David)   •   Semele (Athamas)   •   Theodora (Didymus)
MonteverdiL'incoronazione di Poppea (Ottone)
MozartMitridate, re di Ponto (Farnace)
MuhlyMarnie (Terry Rutland)
VivaldiOrlando Furioso (Ruggiero)
A laboratory scene, with two performers and four projection screens

Projects

An Anatomy of Melancholy

Netia Jones directs a Barbican London production, blending John Dowland's poignant music with Robert Burton's 17th-century treatise The Anatomy of Melancholy. This intimate meditation on sorrow features Iestyn Davies's crystalline voice and lutenist Sergio Bucheli. The performance, inspired by Burton, Freud, and modern emotion experts, combines visuals with Dowland's music. Currently developing international tours for 2025/2026 and beyond.

Learn about this project
  • A laboratory scene, with two performers and four projection screens

    Projects

    An Anatomy of Melancholy

    Netia Jones directs a Barbican London production, blending John Dowland's poignant music with Robert Burton's 17th-century treatise The Anatomy of Melancholy. This intimate meditation on sorrow features Iestyn Davies's crystalline voice and lutenist Sergio Bucheli. The performance, inspired by Burton, Freud, and modern emotion experts, combines visuals with Dowland's music. Currently developing international tours for 2025/2026 and beyond.

    Learn about this project

News

Press

  • Handel and Mozart with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe

    Berlin, Hamburg, Salzburg, Gstaad
    Jan 2025 - Feb 2025
    • Iestyn Davies is one of those hallowed few countertenors who can take a single note on a single syllable and spin it out into a long-breathed thing of immaculate beauty – shifting, modulating and shaped to tug at the heartstrings.

    • The perfectly natural tone of countertenor Iestyn Davies combined with the equally delicate tone of the COE trumpet soloist, Neil Brough, to create the light over a world that will not end as long as there are people who can play and sing like that.

    • Davies does not celebrate his performances like a diva. For an aria from Handel's "Giulio Cesare in Egitto," he almost slithers in, wearing his slim-cut velvet jacket, the certainty of victory already on his face. With his elegant agility, followed by the spotlight, he spreads a James Bond flair. And he sings just as flexibly and agilely. His timbre has something of a dry white wine, it is bright and tart, which greatly benefits the comprehensibility of the text. He is visibly at home in the baroque musical language. It is a pleasure to see how inventive and stylistically confident he is in his ornamentation.

    • ... how ... could the singer Iestyn Davies produce these intimate sounds from a standing start without a mediating introduction? At times it seems superhuman, superhumanly beautiful.