Mariusz Kwiecień

Kwiecień studied at the Warsaw Academy of Music and began his professional career as Aeneas in Purcell's Dido and Aeneas at the Kraków Opera in 1993. In 1995 he sang the title role in The Marriage of Figaro in Luxembourg and Poznań. He made his Warsaw Opera debut the next year as Stanisław in Moniuszko's rarely performed Verbum Nobile. Debuts in major European and American opera houses soon followed. A former student of the Metropolitan Opera's Lindemann Young Artist Development Program, he made his Met debut in 1999 as Kuligin in Janáček's Káťa Kabanová. By 2003 he was singing leading baritone roles there, eventually giving over 200 performances, including Marcello in La bohème (2003), Silvio in Pagliacci (2004), Count Almaviva in The Marriage of Figaro (2005), Guglielmo in Così fan tutte (2005), Dr. Malatesta in Don Pasquale (2006, 2010), Enrico in Lucia di Lammermoor (2007, 2009), Belcore in ''L'Elisir d'Amore (2012), the title role in Eugene Onegin (2013–2017), and Zurga in The Pearl Fishers'' (2015–2018). Kwiecień has won awards in several international voice competitions, including the Vienna State Opera and Hamburg State Opera Prizes in the 1996 Hans Gabor Belvedere Competition and the Mozart Interpretation Prize and Audience Choice Award in the 1998 Francisco Viñas Competition in Barcelona. He was also selected to represent Poland in the 1999 Cardiff Singer of the World competition. In 2017, he received a Grammy Award nomination in the Best Opera Recording category for his performance in Szymanowski: Król Roger conducted by Antonio Pappano and produced by Jonathan Allen. In September 2020 he announced his retirement from singing due to recurrent back problems. He became artistic director of the Wrocław Opera, a role he held until March 2023. ==Recordings==