Dennis McNeil
Encyclopedia
Dennis McNeil, is an American opera
tic tenor
, musical theater performer and concert singer
. He was educated at Miraleste High School
, Loyola High School
(1978), the Institute for the American Musical, Merola Opera Program of San Francisco Opera
and the University of California, Davis
(1983).
National Council Auditions. He sang several leading roles with New York City Opera
, including "Tamino" in The Magic Flute
, "Don Jose" in Carmen
(a role he has sung more than seventy times), in which he was given special note for his acting by the New York Times, and "Mark" in the New York City
stage premiere of Michael Tippett
’s The Midsummer Marriage
for which he received the Richard F. Gold Career Award
.
He has performed with many of the major opera companies in the U.S. apart from New York City Opera, including the New York Metropolitan Opera, San Francisco Opera
, ("Gastone" in La Traviata (1991), Amelia's servant in Un Ballo in Maschera (1990)), New Orleans Opera
, San Diego Opera
as "St. Brioche" in The Merry Widow
(1992) and "Remendado" in Carmen (1992), Western Opera Theater and Los Angeles Opera
where he performed in a 1989 production of Salome
. Other roles include "Pinkerton" in Madama Butterfly
, "Rudolfo"" in La Bohème
and "Alfredo" in La Traviata
.
in The Rising by Richard B. Evans.
more than 140 times in four productions. He also sang "Nikos" in the musical Zorba with John Raitt
in the title role and he toured with lyricist Sammy Cahn
in the musical review Words and Music.
at the games for Los Angeles teams including the Los Angeles Dodgers
. He sang at both the funeral and Dodger Stadium Memorial for the well-known Los Angeles Times
sportswriter, Jim Murray
.
He has sung at numerous other community and charity events, as well as in recital, including appearances abroad in London
, Slovenia
and Linz
, Austria.
He also has a large repertoire of Irish folk songs
which he has performed extensively with his own folk ensemble "Celtic Fire" including at Ashford Castle
in Ireland, and released on CD.
Television appearances have included Hour of Power and KLTA Morning News
in Los Angeles.
He has sung for five American presidents, including the 2001 inauguration, and other heads of state.
He also sings at corporate events and has sung for the Kemper Insurance Open, Aon Insurance and the Hearst Group
.
He appears regularly with Three Tenors and the Hutchins Consort, a Los Angeles based group which has performed at many venues including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art
. The opening of the Harlyne J. Norris Pavilion in Palos Verdes, the Sun Valley Opera Summer Concert
, the Stockton Symphony
's annual holiday concert, a Kennedy Center tribute to playwright, Arthur Miller
for the National Endowment for the Humanities
, the Kennedy Space Center
Memorial for the Crew of Space Shuttle Columbia, the Sedona Rouge Hotel & Spa third anniversary benefit “Summer Dreams Gala”, are just a few of the engagements he has had. He has also produced videos for MTV
and VH-1.
.
National Winner of the Metropolitan Opera National Council, 1993
Rex Foundation
Grant from the Grateful Dead
Richard F. Gold Career Award, New York City Opera, 1994
Southern California Opera Guild Singing Competition, 1st Place
Sullivan Grant]] Recipient
Victor Fuchs Memorial Competition, First Place
He is a member of the Jonathan Club
, Los Angeles and the Bohemian Club
, San Francisco.
He can also be heard on a recording of the oratorio The Rising, composed and orchestrated by Richard B. Evans, words by W. B. Yeats, Maud Gonne, Francis Ledwidge et al.
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
tic tenor
Tenor
The tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...
, musical theater performer and concert singer
Recital
A recital is a musical performance. It can highlight a single performer, sometimes accompanied by piano, or a performance of the works of a single composer.The invention of the solo piano recital has been attributed to Franz Liszt....
. He was educated at Miraleste High School
Miraleste Intermediate School
Miraleste Intermediate School is one of three public middle schools in the Palos Verdes Peninsula Unified School District .-Overview:...
, Loyola High School
Loyola High School (Los Angeles)
Loyola High School of Los Angeles is a Jesuit preparatory school for young men. It is the oldest high school in Southern California, and one of the oldest in California...
(1978), the Institute for the American Musical, Merola Opera Program of San Francisco Opera
San Francisco Opera
San Francisco Opera is an American opera company, based in San Francisco, California.It was founded in 1923 by Gaetano Merola and is the second largest opera company in North America...
and the University of California, Davis
University of California, Davis
The University of California, Davis is a public teaching and research university established in 1905 and located in Davis, California, USA. Spanning over , the campus is the largest within the University of California system and third largest by enrollment...
(1983).
Opera
McNeil was a 1992 National Winner of the Metropolitan OperaMetropolitan Opera
The Metropolitan Opera is an opera company, located in New York City. Originally founded in 1880, the company gave its first performance on October 22, 1883. The company is operated by the non-profit Metropolitan Opera Association, with Peter Gelb as general manager...
National Council Auditions. He sang several leading roles with New York City Opera
New York City Opera
The New York City Opera is an American opera company located in New York City.The company, called "the people's opera" by New York Mayor Fiorello La Guardia, was founded in 1943 with the aim of making opera financially accessible to a wide audience, producing an innovative choice of repertory, and...
, including "Tamino" in The Magic Flute
The Magic Flute
The Magic Flute is an opera in two acts composed in 1791 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a German libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder. The work is in the form of a Singspiel, a popular form that included both singing and spoken dialogue....
, "Don Jose" in Carmen
Carmen
Carmen is a French opéra comique by Georges Bizet. The libretto is by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy, based on the novella of the same title by Prosper Mérimée, first published in 1845, itself possibly influenced by the narrative poem The Gypsies by Alexander Pushkin...
(a role he has sung more than seventy times), in which he was given special note for his acting by the New York Times, and "Mark" in the New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
stage premiere of Michael Tippett
Michael Tippett
Sir Michael Kemp Tippett OM CH CBE was an English composer.In his long career he produced a large body of work, including five operas, three large-scale choral works, four symphonies, five string quartets, four piano sonatas, concertos and concertante works, song cycles and incidental music...
’s The Midsummer Marriage
The Midsummer Marriage
The Midsummer Marriage is an opera in three acts, with music and libretto by Michael Tippett. The work's first performance was at Covent Garden, 27 January 1955, conducted by John Pritchard...
for which he received the Richard F. Gold Career Award
Shoshana Foundation
The Shoshana Foundation is a non-profit organization that was founded in 1986 upon the death of Richard F. Gold who was a long time administrator at both the New York City Opera and Chamber Opera Theater of New York. The foundation's work focuses on assisting promising opera singers at the start of...
.
He has performed with many of the major opera companies in the U.S. apart from New York City Opera, including the New York Metropolitan Opera, San Francisco Opera
San Francisco Opera
San Francisco Opera is an American opera company, based in San Francisco, California.It was founded in 1923 by Gaetano Merola and is the second largest opera company in North America...
, ("Gastone" in La Traviata (1991), Amelia's servant in Un Ballo in Maschera (1990)), New Orleans Opera
New Orleans Opera
Opera has long been part of the musical culture of New Orleans, Louisiana. Operas have regularly been performed in the city since the 1790s, and for the majority of the city's history since the early 19th century, New Orleans has had a resident company regularly performing opera in addition to...
, San Diego Opera
San Diego Opera
The San Diego Opera Association is a professional opera company located in the city of San Diego, California and is a member of OPERA America. It was founded in 1950 to present productions by San Francisco Opera in the San Diego area...
as "St. Brioche" in The Merry Widow
The Merry Widow
The Merry Widow is an operetta by the Austro–Hungarian composer Franz Lehár. The librettists, Viktor Léon and Leo Stein, based the story – concerning a rich widow, and her countrymen's attempt to keep her money in the principality by finding her the right husband – on an 1861 comedy play,...
(1992) and "Remendado" in Carmen (1992), Western Opera Theater and Los Angeles Opera
Los Angeles Opera
The Los Angeles Opera is an opera company in Los Angeles, California. It is the fourth largest opera company in the United States. The company's home base is the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, part of the Los Angeles Music Center.-Current leadership:...
where he performed in a 1989 production of Salome
Salome (opera)
Salome is an opera in one act by Richard Strauss to a German libretto by the composer, based on Hedwig Lachmann’s German translation of the French play Salomé by Oscar Wilde. Strauss dedicated the opera to his friend Sir Edgar Speyer....
. Other roles include "Pinkerton" in Madama Butterfly
Madama Butterfly
Madama Butterfly is an opera in three acts by Giacomo Puccini, with an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa. Puccini based his opera in part on the short story "Madame Butterfly" by John Luther Long, which was dramatized by David Belasco...
, "Rudolfo"" in La Bohème
La bohème
La bohème is an opera in four acts,Puccini called the divisions quadro, a tableau or "image", rather than atto . by Giacomo Puccini to an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa, based on Scènes de la vie de bohème by Henri Murger...
and "Alfredo" in La Traviata
La traviata
La traviata is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi set to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave. It is based on La dame aux Camélias , a play adapted from the novel by Alexandre Dumas, fils. The title La traviata means literally The Fallen Woman, or perhaps more figuratively, The Woman...
.
Oratorio
Appearances include the tenor part in Verdi's Requiem with the Kalamazoo Singers and the role of William Butler YeatsWilliam Butler Yeats
William Butler Yeats was an Irish poet and playwright, and one of the foremost figures of 20th century literature. A pillar of both the Irish and British literary establishments, in his later years he served as an Irish Senator for two terms...
in The Rising by Richard B. Evans.
Musical Theatre
On the musical theater stage he has sung the role of "Mr. Snow" in CarouselCarousel (musical)
Carousel is the second stage musical by the team of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II . The work premiered in 1945 and was adapted from Ferenc Molnár's 1909 play Liliom, transplanting its Budapest setting to the Maine coastline...
more than 140 times in four productions. He also sang "Nikos" in the musical Zorba with John Raitt
John Raitt
John Emmett Raitt was an American actor and singer best known for his performances in musical theater.-Early years:...
in the title role and he toured with lyricist Sammy Cahn
Sammy Cahn
Sammy Cahn was an American lyricist, songwriter and musician. He is best known for his romantic lyrics to films and Broadway songs, as well as stand-alone songs premiered by recording companies in the Greater Los Angeles Area...
in the musical review Words and Music.
Recitals and Special Events
He frequently sings the American National AnthemThe Star-Spangled Banner
"The Star-Spangled Banner" is the national anthem of the United States of America. The lyrics come from "Defence of Fort McHenry", a poem written in 1814 by the 35-year-old lawyer and amateur poet, Francis Scott Key, after witnessing the bombardment of Fort McHenry by the British Royal Navy ships...
at the games for Los Angeles teams including the Los Angeles Dodgers
Los Angeles Dodgers
The Los Angeles Dodgers are a professional baseball team based in Los Angeles, California. The Dodgers are members of Major League Baseball's National League West Division. Established in 1883, the team originated in Brooklyn, New York, where it was known by a number of nicknames before becoming...
. He sang at both the funeral and Dodger Stadium Memorial for the well-known Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
sportswriter, Jim Murray
Jim Murray (sportswriter)
James Patrick Murray was an American sportswriter at the Los Angeles Times from 1961 to 1998.Many of his achievements include winning the NSSA's Sportswriter of the Year award an astounding fourteen times...
.
He has sung at numerous other community and charity events, as well as in recital, including appearances abroad in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, Slovenia
Slovenia
Slovenia , officially the Republic of Slovenia , is a country in Central and Southeastern Europe touching the Alps and bordering the Mediterranean. Slovenia borders Italy to the west, Croatia to the south and east, Hungary to the northeast, and Austria to the north, and also has a small portion of...
and Linz
Linz
Linz is the third-largest city of Austria and capital of the state of Upper Austria . It is located in the north centre of Austria, approximately south of the Czech border, on both sides of the river Danube. The population of the city is , and that of the Greater Linz conurbation is about...
, Austria.
He also has a large repertoire of Irish folk songs
Folk music of Ireland
The folk music of Ireland is the generic term for music that has been created in various genres in Ireland.-History:...
which he has performed extensively with his own folk ensemble "Celtic Fire" including at Ashford Castle
Ashford Castle
Ashford Castle is a medieval castle turned five star luxury hotel near Cong on the Mayo/Galway Border in Ireland, on the shore of Lough Corrib. Ashford Castle is a member of the Leading Hotels of the World organization.-History:...
in Ireland, and released on CD.
Television appearances have included Hour of Power and KLTA Morning News
KTLA
KTLA, virtual channel 5, is a television station in Los Angeles, California, USA. Owned by the Tribune Company, KTLA is an affiliate of the CW Television Network. KTLA's studios are on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood, and its transmitter is located atop Mount Wilson...
in Los Angeles.
He has sung for five American presidents, including the 2001 inauguration, and other heads of state.
He also sings at corporate events and has sung for the Kemper Insurance Open, Aon Insurance and the Hearst Group
Hearst Corporation
The Hearst Corporation is an American media conglomerate based in the Hearst Tower, Manhattan in New York City, New York, United States. Founded by William Randolph Hearst as an owner of newspapers, the company's holdings now include a wide variety of media...
.
He appears regularly with Three Tenors and the Hutchins Consort, a Los Angeles based group which has performed at many venues including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
The Los Angeles County Museum of Art is an art museum in Los Angeles, California. It is located on Wilshire Boulevard along Museum Row in the Miracle Mile vicinity of Los Angeles, adjacent to the George C. Page Museum and La Brea Tar Pits....
. The opening of the Harlyne J. Norris Pavilion in Palos Verdes, the Sun Valley Opera Summer Concert
Sun Valley Opera House
The Sun Valley Opera House was built in 1937 in Sun Valley, Idaho, as a movie theater. The picturesque Opera House has a 344-seat capacity and a state-of-the-art sound system . It is the site for special events and as well as nightly showing of first-run movies...
, the Stockton Symphony
Stockton Symphony
The Stockton Symphony Association is an American orchestra based in Stockton, California. It was founded in 1926 by Manlio Silva and is the third oldest orchestra in California.Since 1995 Peter Jaffe has been music director and conductor.-Concert halls:...
's annual holiday concert, a Kennedy Center tribute to playwright, Arthur Miller
Arthur Miller
Arthur Asher Miller was an American playwright and essayist. He was a prominent figure in American theatre, writing dramas that include plays such as All My Sons , Death of a Salesman , The Crucible , and A View from the Bridge .Miller was often in the public eye,...
for the National Endowment for the Humanities
National Endowment for the Humanities
The National Endowment for the Humanities is an independent federal agency of the United States established by the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965 dedicated to supporting research, education, preservation, and public programs in the humanities. The NEH is located at...
, the Kennedy Space Center
Kennedy Space Center
The John F. Kennedy Space Center is the NASA installation that has been the launch site for every United States human space flight since 1968. Although such flights are currently on hiatus, KSC continues to manage and operate unmanned rocket launch facilities for America's civilian space program...
Memorial for the Crew of Space Shuttle Columbia, the Sedona Rouge Hotel & Spa third anniversary benefit “Summer Dreams Gala”, are just a few of the engagements he has had. He has also produced videos for MTV
MTV
MTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs....
and VH-1.
Family
Dennis McNeil is a fourth generation Californian and lives with his wife Cindy and daughters Theresa, Julia and Maura near the beach in Southern CaliforniaSouthern California
Southern California is a megaregion, or megapolitan area, in the southern area of the U.S. state of California. Large urban areas include Greater Los Angeles and Greater San Diego. The urban area stretches along the coast from Ventura through the Southland and Inland Empire to San Diego...
.
Awards
Emily Baratelli Memorial Award from the New York Opera IndexNational Winner of the Metropolitan Opera National Council, 1993
Rex Foundation
Rex Foundation
The Rex Foundation was created by "members of the Grateful Dead and Friends" in 1983 as a charitable non-profit organization to "proactively provide extensive community support to creative endeavors in the arts, sciences, and education." The organization is named after Rex Jackson, a Grateful Dead...
Grant from the Grateful Dead
Richard F. Gold Career Award, New York City Opera, 1994
Southern California Opera Guild Singing Competition, 1st Place
Sullivan Grant]] Recipient
Victor Fuchs Memorial Competition, First Place
He is a member of the Jonathan Club
Jonathan Club
The Jonathan Club is a private social club in Los Angeles, California, U.S. It maintains two clubhouses, one in downtown Los Angeles at 545 South Figueroa Street and one on the beach in Santa Monica. The Los Angeles headquarters has dining and residential facilities, ballrooms, a health club, a...
, Los Angeles and the Bohemian Club
Bohemian Club
The Bohemian Club is a private men's club in San Francisco, California, United States.Its clubhouse is located at 624 Taylor Street in San Francisco...
, San Francisco.
Discography
Dennis McNeil has released several recordings on his own label, DMI Productions which include: Ave Maria, Celtic Fire, Forever Irish, It's Christmas! and The Spirit of Christmas, samples from which can be heard on his official website. http://dennismcneil.com/newsite/listen.htmlHe can also be heard on a recording of the oratorio The Rising, composed and orchestrated by Richard B. Evans, words by W. B. Yeats, Maud Gonne, Francis Ledwidge et al.