Described by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution as a dignified and beautiful singer, Paul Max Tipton, baritone, is building an impressive career in opera, oratorio, and early music. Upcoming and recent engagements include Britten’s War Requiem with the Lincoln Symphony Orchestra and the American Boy Choir; concerts of Charpentier and Couperin with Ensemble VIII in Austin; the part of Christus in Bach’s St. John Passionwith the Back Bay Chorale in Boston; the role of Apollon in Rameau’s La Lyre Enchantéewith Jacques Ogg and the Lyra Baroque Orchestra in Saint Paul; and a recording of the Brahms Requiem with Seraphic Fire and Patrick Dupré Quigley in Miami, which was honored with a 2012 Grammy nomination.
Highlights from past seasons include performances of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony with the Grand Rapids Symphony; Haydn’s Paukenmesse with the Yale Camerata; Haydn’sSalve Regina in G minor with Nicholas McGegan; Bach’sChristmas Oratorio with Helmuth Rilling for the Discovery Series at the Oregon Bach Festival; a recording of Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610 with Seraphic Fire and Patrick Dupré Quigley in Kalamazoo; a performance of the Vespers with the Grand Rapids Symphony and David Lockington; the part of Christus in Bach’s St. Matthew Passion with Boston University’s Marsh Chapel and Scott Allen Jarrett; and Handel’s Dettingen Te Deum with Ton Koopman at Carnegie Hall.
Mr. Tipton trained on full fellowship at the University of Michigan School of Music in Ann Arbor, where he was mentored by mezzo-soprano Luretta Bybee and Martin Katz; under Katz’s direction he performed the title role in Don Giovanni. He sang the role of Judas in Bach’s St. Matthew Passion under Helmuth Rilling at Carnegie Hall in 2007, and soloed under Leonard Slatkin on the Naxos recording of William Bolcom’s Songs of Innocence and of Experience, a project that won three Grammys in 2006. He has sung Schaunard in La Bohème with the New York Opera Society while on tour in Toulouse, and has worked closely with composer Ricky Ian Gordon, joining him twice in recital in Ann Arbor and Florence, Italy.
Mr. Tipton is based in Boston, and is a 2010 graduate of the Yale University Institute of Sacred Music, where he studied with tenor James Taylor.