Curriculum Vitae
Dutch baritone Marcel Boone has performed on international stages in concert and opera. He has made appearances at the Dutch National Opera, Staatsoper Berlin, Opéra National de Lyon, Stanislavsky Theatre Moscow, Volksoper Wien, Teatro Regio di Parma, Opéra national de Montpellier and Opera Zuid, and in concert venues in Köln, Bonn, Brussels and Madrid. He received much praise for his interpretations of Mozart and gained critical acclaim for his roles as Don Giovanni, Count Almaviva and Guglielmo. The recording of Così fan tutte with René Jacobs (harmonia mundi) received numerous honours including the Edison Classic Award, Diapason d’Or and Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik.
His professional debut as a lyric baritone was with the Nationale Reisopera in the Netherlands. For seven seasons this touring company would be his home base, where he successfully performed numerous roles including Lescaut (Manon Lescaut), Schaunard (La bohème), Guglielmo (Così fan tutte), Count Almaviva (Le nozze di Figaro), Ned Keene (Peter Grimes) and Don Fernando (Fidelio). “These were the best training years for me as an opera singer: many performances and constant travelling gave me a solid basis for my career.”
Marcel Boone was a regular guest with the Dutch National Opera, performing in outstanding, international productions with notable stage directors including Dario Fo’s Il barbiere di Siviglia and Pierre Audi’s La bohème. He sung in a production of Prokofiev’s L' amour des trois oranges and was part of an esteemed cast for Händel’s Giulio Cesare under the direction of Marc Minkowski. For the opening of the Holland Festival he sung the world premiere of Theo Loevendie’s Johnny and Jones, a moving portrait of two entertainers during the Second World War.
Marcel’s repertoire gradually changed from lyric repertoire to the Kavalier Fach, and included increasingly more Puccini and Verdi roles such as Germont (La traviata) and Ford (Falstaff). To date he has performed more than 50 opera roles. His concert engagements included performances of J.S. Bach’s Passions, Orff’s Carmina Burana, Brahms’ Requiem, and Faure’s Requiem in the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. He has collaborated with various conductors including Marc Minkowski, René Jacobs, Yves Abel, Nikša Bareza, Paolo Carignani, Thomas Hengelbrock, Jaap van Zweden and Marc Albrecht. His collaboration with René Jacobs opened the doors to many international opera stages, concert halls and festivals including Festival de Musique Montreux, Innsbruck Festival, Schwetzingen Festival, International Music Festival Milan and Dresdner Musikfestspiele.
Marcel studied at the Utrechts Conservatorium, the Royal Conservatory in The Hague and at the International Opera Studio in Amsterdam with Margreet Honig, who was his principal teacher and coach. He won several international scholarships and studied with Professor Horst Guenter and Thomas Hampson.
Currently Marcel is Professor of Singing at the Hochschule für Musik Basel and as of 2016 he has been appointed Professor of Singing at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris. In addition to his conservatory teaching, Marcel has a private studio for professional singers.