Jess Thomas (August 4, 1927 – October 11, 1993) was an American operatic tenor, best known for singing
Wagner
Wilhelm Richard Wagner ( ; ; 22 May 181313 February 1883) was a German composer, theatre director, polemicist, and conductor who is chiefly known for his operas (or, as some of his mature works were later known, "music dramas"). Unlike most op ...
compositions.
Biography
Jess Floyd Thomas was born in
Hot Springs, South Dakota
Hot Springs (Lakota: ''mni kȟáta''; "hot water") is a city in and county seat of Fall River County, South Dakota, United States. As of the 2020 census, the city population was 3,395. In addition, neighboring Oglala Lakota County contracts the ...
. As a child, he took part in various musical activities and studied psychology at the
University of Nebraska
A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, ...
. For several years, he worked as a high school guidance counselor, before enrolling at
Stanford University for an MA. Learning that the operatic department was producing Verdi's ''
Falstaff
Sir John Falstaff is a fictional character who appears in three plays by William Shakespeare and is eulogised in a fourth. His significance as a fully developed character is primarily formed in the plays '' Henry IV, Part 1'' and '' Part 2'', w ...
'', he auditioned for
Otto Schulmann, the vocal professor, and obtained the role of Fenton. Although by now 27 years old, Thomas decided to change careers and to become a singer. He studied with Schulmann for three years before his operatic debut in 1957.
In 1958, he joined the
Badisches Staatstheater in Karlsruhe, Germany. He was awarded the
Wagner Medal at
Bayreuth in 1963. His many appearances in North America and Europe between the late 1950s and early 1980s included fifteen seasons in 109 performances of fifteen roles at the
Metropolitan Opera
The Metropolitan Opera (commonly known as the Met) is an American opera company based in New York City, resident at the Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center, currently situated on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. The company is oper ...
in New York City.
Thomas died in
Tiburon, California
Tiburon (; es, Tiburón, ) is an incorporated town in Marin County, California. It is located on the Tiburon Peninsula, which reaches south into the San Francisco Bay. It shares a ZIP code with the smaller incorporated city of Belvedere (for ...
in 1993, aged 66.
Operatic career
Thomas made his operatic debut in 1957 for the
San Francisco Opera
San Francisco Opera (SFO) is an American opera company founded in 1923 by Gaetano Merola (1881–1953) based in San Francisco, California.
History
Gaetano Merola (1923–1953)
Merola's road to prominence in the Bay Area began in 1906 when h ...
, performing in
Richard Strauss's ''
Der Rosenkavalier
(''The Knight of the Rose'' or ''The Rose-Bearer''), Op. 59, is a comic opera in three acts by Richard Strauss to an original German libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal. It is loosely adapted from the novel ''Les amours du chevalier de Faublas'' ...
'' as the Haushofmeister. In 1958, he debuted in the title role of
Richard Wagner's ''
Lohengrin
Lohengrin () is a character in German Arthurian literature. The son of Parzival (Percival), he is a knight of the Holy Grail sent in a boat pulled by swans to rescue a maiden who can never ask his identity. His story, which first appears in Wolf ...
'' for the Karlsruhe Staatstheater at the commencement of a career in Germany.
It was at Bayreuth that he established his reputation as a Wagnerian tenor, performing in the following roles and operas:
*
Parsifal
''Parsifal'' ( WWV 111) is an opera or a music drama in three acts by the German composer Richard Wagner and his last composition. Wagner's own libretto for the work is loosely based on the 13th-century Middle High German epic poem ''Parzival ...
1961–63, 1965
* Lohengrin 1962, 1967
* Siegmund in ''
Die Walküre
(; ''The Valkyrie''), WWV 86B, is the second of the four music dramas that constitute Richard Wagner's ''Der Ring des Nibelungen'' (English: ''The Ring of the Nibelung''). It was performed, as a single opera, at the National Theatre Munich on ...
'' (Bayreuth Festival on Tour in Osaka) 1967
* Walther in ''
Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg'' 1963, 1969
*
Tannhäuser
Tannhäuser (; gmh, Tanhûser), often stylized, "The Tannhäuser," was a German Minnesinger and traveling poet. Historically, his biography, including the dates he lived, is obscure beyond the poetry, which suggests he lived between 1245 and ...
1966–67
*
Siegfried
Siegfried is a German-language male given name, composed from the Germanic elements ''sig'' "victory" and ''frithu'' "protection, peace".
The German name has the Old Norse cognate ''Sigfriðr, Sigfrøðr'', which gives rise to Swedish ''Sigfrid' ...
1969, 1976
In 1963, Thomas joined the roster of the Metropolitan Opera and went on to sing 109 performances of fifteen roles with the company, including all the major tenor roles of Wagner's work. Among the highlights of his career with the Met was appearing at the opening of the new
Metropolitan Opera House at
Lincoln Center
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts (also simply known as Lincoln Center) is a complex of buildings in the Lincoln Square neighborhood on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. It has thirty indoor and outdoor facilities and is host to 5 milli ...
, in the first performance of
Samuel Barber's ''
Antony and Cleopatra'' with
Leontyne Price
Mary Violet Leontyne Price (born February 10, 1927) is an American soprano who was the first African American soprano to receive international acclaim. From 1961 she began a long association with the Metropolitan Opera, where she was the first Af ...
.
On December 9, 1981, San Francisco Opera general director
Kurt Herbert Adler
Kurt Herbert Adler (2 April 1905 – 9 February 1988) was an Austrian-born American conductor and opera house director.
Biography
Adler was born in Vienna, Austria, to a Jewish family; his mother, Ida Bauer, was one of the first patients of ...
called Thomas an hour before a performance of ''Die Walküre''. Heldentenor
James King had lost his voice, and Adler asked Thomas if he would like to sing the role in an hour. "But I haven't even shaved yet", Thomas said. Though he hadn't looked at the score in years, Thomas performed the role at the age of 54, relying on a memory of the role, with some prompting. The next day, headlines proclaimed Thomas's eleventh-hour rescue for ''Die Walküre''. Thomas's farewell performance took place in the title role of ''Parsifal'' with the Metropolitan Opera in 1982, while it was on tour in Washington, D.C.
In 1997, on request of Thomas's widow, Violeta Thomas, the Austrian sculptor
Hortensia Fussy made a portrait of Jess Thomas, showing him as Siegfried with his sword. The sculpture was donated to the
Austrian Theatre Museum
The Theatermuseum is a federal museum of national theatre history. Since 1991 it is situated in the Palais Lobkowitz in Vienna.
History
The museum has its origins in the theatre-related collections of the Austrian National Library, dating back t ...
in 2002.
References
External links
Jess Thomas biographyHistory of the Tenor / Jess Thomas / Sound clips and narration
{{DEFAULTSORT:Thomas, Jess
1927 births
1993 deaths
People from Hot Springs, South Dakota
University of Nebraska–Lincoln alumni
American operatic tenors
Heldentenors
Singers from South Dakota
Classical musicians from South Dakota
20th-century American male opera singers