Christopher Burchett’s rich, no-holds-barred voice and committed stagecraft have earned him a place on the stages of opera companies and orchestras throughout the United States and Europe including New York City Opera, Santa Fe Opera, Boston Lyric Opera, the Estates Theatre in Prague, The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Opera Theatre of St. Louis, BBC Orchestra at the Barbican Centre, Glimmerglass Opera, Beth Morrison Projects, Prototype Festival, Fort Worth Opera, The Holland Festival, Palm Beach Opera, Virginia Opera, Opera Omaha, Opera Saratoga, Chicago Opera Theater, Eugene Opera, Indianapolis Opera, Kentucky Opera and Opera Orchestra of New York. Christopher’s versatile acting and vocal abilities have allowed him to perform over one hundred operatic roles to date and he has been described by Opera News as a “fearlessly vulnerable” performer “who gave an unflinchingly, heroically human performance that will linger long in the memory.”
A champion of new music, Christopher has created roles in 16 world premieres to date. Some of those roles include the title role in Paola Prestini and Cerise Jacobs’ Gilgamesh with Beth Morrison Projects and Friends of Madam White Snake, M. Carré-Lamadon in Stephen Hartke's The Greater Good with Glimmerglass Opera, Baritone Soloist in Paul Moravec's Blizzard Voices with Opera Omaha, Jack Absolute in Kirke Mechem’s The Rivals with Skylight Opera Theatre, Soldier in Paola Prestini’s Oceanic Verses at The Kennedy Center, Victor in Jeff Meyer’s Buried Alive with Fort Worth Opera and Fargo Moorhead Opera and Orsen in Edwin Penhorwood’s Too Many Sopranos with Cedar Rapids Opera Theatre.
He has also participated in the revival of several 20th and 21st century works, some of which include Blazes in Peter Maxwell Davies’ The Lighthouse with Boston Lyric Opera, Father Palmer in Kevin Puts and Mark Campbell's Silent Night with Fort Worth Opera, Restless Mourning by Anthony Davis with Opera Omaha and Palivec and General von Schwarzburg in Robert Kurka’s The Good Soldier Schweik with Glimmerglass Opera.
Widely sought after for his concert work, Christopher has appeared with many of the country’s finest Bach festivals including the Carmel Bach Festival, Boulder Bach Festival, Louisville Bach Society and Bethlehem Bach Festival where he sang Bach’s B Minor Mass as part of an Emmy winning national PBS broadcast entitled “Make a Joyful Noise”. Other concert highlights include The Parable of the Law with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, Britten’s War Requiem with both the Louisville Orchestra and Washington Chorus at the Kennedy Center, Handel's Messiah with the Portland Baroque Orchestra, Elijah with Omaha Symphony, Sandro in American Symphony Orchestra's concert production of Mona Lisa at Carnegie Hall, Vaughan Williams’ A Sea Symphony with Princeton Pro Musica, Vaughn Williams’ Fantasia on Christmas Carols with the New York Choral Society at Carnegie Hall, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony with the New Hampshire Music Festival, Mozart's C Minor Mass with Orchestra Now at Carnegie Hall, and "So in Love With Broadway", a concert of musical standards and selections of hits from the music of Frank Loesser with the Omaha Symphony.
Christopher can be heard on the Naxos record label in Stephen Hartke’s The Greater Good, Julian Wachner’s Come My Dark Eyed One, Mohammed Fairouz’s No Orpheus and the title role of Bernard Rands’ opera Vincent. Other recordings available include Arnold Rosner's The Parable of the Law recorded with the London Philharmonic Orchestra on the Toccata Classics label as well as the first complete recording of Marc Blitzstein's The Cradle Will Rock on Bridge Records, Paola Prestini's Oceanic Verses on the VIA label, David Lang’s The Difficulty of Crossing a Field on the Cantaloupe label and Joseph Summer’s The Tempest on Albany Records. He can also currently be heard on the Opera America label as part of the "Opera America Songbook", a recorded collection of 47 songs commissioned to celebrate the opening of the National Opera Center.
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