Will Liverman — Baritone
Called “a voice for this historic moment” (The Washington Post), GRAMMY® Award-winning baritone Will Liverman has been hailed as “a gifted chameleon of a singing actor who disappears into his roles” (Opera Magazine) with a “beaming, high baritone that easily asserts” (LA Times). Renowned for his versatility on the operatic stage and his artistry as a composer, curator, and advocate, Liverman is helping to redefine the future of opera. He is the co-creator of The Factotum—a “mic-drop fabulous good” (Opera News) reimagining of Rossini’s Il Barbiere di Siviglia set in a modern-day Chicago barbershop—which premiered to sold-out audiences at Lyric Opera of Chicago in 2023.
Recent highlights include his acclaimed appearance in the title role of X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X at The Metropolitan Opera, where The Wall Street Journal declared, “[this is] the best I’ve ever heard him.” He has also starred in the world premieres of Rene Orth’s 10 Days in a Madhouse (Opera Philadelphia) and Anthony Davis’s Malcolm X (Met Opera, revised score), and brought memorable portrayals to the Met as Mercutio (Roméo et Juliette), Horemhab (Akhnaten), and Malcolm Fleet (Marnie). Earlier, he made history as the first Black Papageno in the company’s production of The Magic Flute. Other operatic highlights include Pelléas (Pelléas et Mélisande, LA Opera), Figaro (Il Barbiere di Siviglia across U.S. houses), Zurga (Les pêcheurs de perles, Austin Opera), and Porgy (Porgy and Bess, Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal).
Liverman is in demand with the world’s leading orchestras and festivals. Recent and upcoming engagements include appearances at the BBC Proms, Tanglewood, Aspen Music Festival, Carnegie Hall, Wigmore Hall, Concertgebouw, Edinburgh Festival, and Oxford International Song Festival, with performances ranging from Orff’s Carmina Burana and Brahms’s Ein deutsches Requiem to Kaija Saariaho’s Sombre. He collaborates frequently with conductors including Sir Antonio Pappano, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, and Kazem Abdullah, and has sung with the London Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, St. Louis Symphony, Hamburg Philharmonic, and Cincinnati Symphony, among many others.
As a recording artist, Liverman’s discography reflects his commitment to championing diverse voices. His 2024 album Show Me the Way (Cedille Records), a celebration of female composers past and present, was praised as “glorious” (BBC Music) and nominated for the 2025 GRAMMY® Award for Best Classical Solo Vocal Album. Earlier albums include Dreams of a New Day: Songs by Black Composers (Cedille, 2021), which debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Traditional Classical chart and was nominated for a GRAMMY, and Whither Must I Wander (Odradek, 2020), named one of the Chicago Tribune’s “best classical recordings of the year.” His multimedia projects include The Dunbar/Moore Sessions (with a special 2025 CD/vinyl release), as well as Breaking Music and National Sawdust premieres of his own compositions.
An alumnus of the Ryan Opera Center at Lyric Opera of Chicago and a graduate of The Juilliard School (M.M.) and Wheaton College, Liverman has earned the Metropolitan Opera’s Beverly Sills Artist Award (2022), the Marian Anderson Vocal Award (2020), and the Sphinx Medal of Excellence (2019), among many others.
Please visit www.willliverman.com for more information.