British baritone Johnny Herford is known for his fearless and passionate commitment to new approaches in opera. This has led him to premiere main roles in operas by Philip Glass, Pascal Dusapin,
Péter Eötvös
and Maxwell Davies and to collaborate with dancers, multimedia elements and act multiple roles in quick succession.
In 2014, Johnny was asked to create the central role of Josef K in Philip Glass's adaptation of The Trial by Kafka. This opened in the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden to five star reviews and Johnny's performance led to him being nominated for Best Male Performance in an Opera at the Welsh Theatre Awards.
Johnny has relished his collaborations with Mike McCarthy and Music Theatre Wales, which have seen him search for a missing tooth in Eötvös's The Golden Dragon, sing neo-baroque extended techniques from the top of a ladder in Passion by Pascal Dusapin, and most recently perform Philip Venables's score of Denis and Katya to an in-ear click track in sync with cellists from the London Sinfonietta, while switching between six different onstage personas.
Other operatic highlights have included roles in Deborah Warner's production of Billy Budd for Opera di Roma, Bernard Herman's Wuthering Heights for Opéra national de Lorraine, The Traveller in Curlew River for Opéra de Dijon, Samuel for a run of Mike Leigh's production of The Pirates of Penzance for English National Opera, understudying the role of Pelléas for Welsh National Opera and his recent American debut for Opera Philadelphia.
Johnny's lifelong love of song has been developed in a long and fruitful duo partnership with William Vann, with whom he won the Song Prize at the Kathleen Ferrier Competition and the Jean Meikle Duo Prize at the Wigmore Hall International Song Competition. Will is the founder and curator of the London English Song Festival and Johnny has enjoyed many performances with Will's inventive programming. Johnny has collaborated with other outstanding recital pianists including James Ballieu at the invitation of the Wigmore Hall, Gary Matthewman for his Lied in London series, Libby Burgess for the Oxford Lieder Festival and her New Paths Festival and Joseph Middleton in the Leeds Lieder Festival.