The American tenor, Stephen Gould, died on September 19 at the age of 61. As a prolific heldentenor, Gould was a frequent artist on the Bayreuth Festival stage, appearing in almost 100 performances over a period of 18 years.

Born in Virginia, Gould trained as a baritone at the New England Conservatory of Music where he studied with John Moriarty. He went on to appear in the Broadway run of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Phantom of the Opera as Raoul, a part he played for eight years and in over 3000 performances. After a short while training under baritone John Fiorito, Gould began to appear in more operatic productions. And while initially playing more lyrical roles such as Argirio in Rossini’s Tancredi with Los Angeles Opera in 1989, he quickly transitioned to the heavier and more heroic late romantic German roles through Fiorito’s influence.

Gould made his Bayreuth Festival debut in 2004 as the titular Tannhäuser and subsequently took on the roles of Siegfried and Tristan (a role he played six times at the Festival alone). In a review of his 2017 Bayreuth performance in Tristan und Isolde, Gramophone’s Mike Ashman described him as showing ‘immense understanding of and ability to communicate’. Famed for his powerful voice and excellent stamina – Bayreuth described him as a ‘long-distance runner’ – Gould quickly became in high demand at opera houses across the world, appearing in Otello at the Semperoper Dresden, Der fliegende Holländer at the Teatro Massimo, Palermo and Die tote Stadt with the Vienna State Opera, Staatsoper Berlin and the Royal Opera House among many others. He was also no stranger to the concert stage, with works including Beethoven’s Ninth (which he recorded with both Donald Runnicles and Christian Thielemann) as well as the Missa solemnis, Mahler's Eighth Symphony and Das Lied von der Erde and Schoenberg's Gurrelieder.

Born January 24, 1962; died September 19, 2023