Professional Summary
David Adams served as Professor of Voice and Head of the Performance Studies Division at the College-Conservatory of Music, University of Cincinnati, before retiring in 2015. He has served on the faculty of the Aspen Music School, and has been artistic director of the Opera Theater and Music Festival of Lucca (Italy), and its successor, CCM Spoleto, summer programs of the College-Conservatory of Music. Prof. Adams is the author of A Handbook of Diction for Singers published by Oxford University Press (now in its second edition), and The Song and Duet Texts of Antonín Dvorák, published by Leyerle Publications. He has also written articles for periodicals, including The Journal of Singing. Students of his have won prestigious competitions, including the Metropolitan Opera Auditions, the Houston Grand Opera and the National Federation of Music Clubs, and have participated in the major summer apprentice programs. Former students are singing professionally in Europe and the US and are teaching throughout the US.
As a performer, specialized areas of interest included the evangelist roles in J. S. Bach’s Passions (A "superb diction and feeling,” Dayton Daily News), Czech vocal music (Janácek’s The Diary of One Who Vanished: “…a splendid performance. He evoked so much beauty from the vocal lines and the Czech text,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch), and contemporary music (Musical America called him "a compelling interpreter" of Elliott Carter’s In Sleep, In Thunder). His interest in Czech vocal music culminated in a CD recording of songs of Dvorák and Smetana in January 2005.
Before his teaching career, Adams sang as lyric tenor in opera and concert in Italy, Austria, Germany, Luxembourg, and the US. In Austria and Germany he was a member of the resident ensembles of the Vienna Kammeroper, Kaiserslautern Pfalztheater, and Saarländisches Staatstheater, and also appeared on German television. In Italy he sang with the Opera Barga Festival for three years. He has performed as tenor soloist with numerous regional orchestras throughout the US. He has degrees from Indiana University and the University of New Mexico, and pursued additional studies at L’Accademia di Santa Cecilia, Rome, Italy as the recipient of a Fulbright Grant.
Education
BS: Indiana University
MM: University of New Mexico