Stephen Costello begins his 2017/18 season making his Opéra national de Paris debut as Camille from Lehar's La Veuve joyeuse, with 15 performances in September and October.

It was with Lehár’s Camille that, while still a graduate student, Stephen made his Dallas Opera debut. Stephen has reprised the role multiple times since then, most recently for Chicago Lyric Opera and at the Metropolitan Opera alongside Susan Graham, where he “sang with big, full tone and a firm sense of the swooping, darting style of Lehár” (New York Observer).

Stephen now returns to the role for his Parisian debut, in Jorge Lavelli’s production conducted by Jakub Hrůša and Marius Stieghorst taking turns on the podium. He joins Véronique Gens in the title role, Valentina Naforniţă as Valencienne, Thomas Hampson as Graf Danilo Danilowitsch, and Alexandre Duhamel as Vicomte Cascada.

Stephen Costello: “I’m very excited to start my season in Paris singing Camille in The Merry Widow. As an opera singer, it’s the closest I'll personally get to singing in the musical theater style. It incorporates acting, it incorporates dancing, it incorporates singing and spoken dialogue, and interactions with many different characters, and it’s also a funny piece. I’ve always sung it in English before, so to sing it in its native language is a true challenge for me – this will be my first German role! And it’s also my debut in Paris. I’ve only ever been in the city for about 24 hours before, so it’ll be really incredible to spend some time there.”

Following La Veuve joyeuse, Stephen will make his house debut at Semperoper Dresden as Rodolfo in La Bohème, and his house and role debuts at the Liceu Barcelona as Ferrand in a new production of La Favorite. Other season highlights include Rodolfo for Teatro Real Madrid; Duca from Verdi's Rigoletto for Canadian Opera, Semperoper Dresden and the Deutsche Oper Berlin; title role of Faust with the Moscow State Philharmonic Orchestra and performances of Dvořák’s Stabat Mater with the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Manfred Honeck.

Performances of La Veuve joyeuse take place from 9 September to 21 October 2017. More information here.