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Maggini Quartet
William Berger
Ian Lake

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WILLIAM BERGER

(Baritone)

William Berger was born in South Africa and is currently a student on the opera course at the Royal Academy of Music where he studies with Mark Wildman and Audrey Hyland. Winner of the UNISA/SAMRO Bursary and the National Panasonic Music Competition, he was also awarded the Kathleen Ferrier Society Bursary for Young Singers in 1999.  

William made his operatic debut at the Göttingen Handel Festival in Germany as Ormonte in Handel's Partenope. A live recording of which has recently been released on disc. In the summer of 2002 he created the role of Oberon in A Summer Night’s Dream for the Mozart/Shakespeare project at the Aix-en-Provence Festival and toured to Madrid, Orleans, Munich and Ingolstadt with the same production. More recently William sang Harasta in the Royal Academy Opera’s production of The Cunning Little Vixen conducted by Sir Charles Mackerras and sang the role of The Count in Le Nozze di Figaro for The Little Theatre in the Alberres, France. Other performances include Carmina Burana with the CBSO, Saint-Saens' Oratoire de Noel with the Complesso Internazionale Cameristica in Milan, the Messiah at the Pacific Music Festival in Japan, Elijah with the British Choral Institute and the world premiere of The Angry Garden by Michael Stimpson in St. John’s, Smith Square. He has toured as soloist with the English Concert Singers to Australia and Bali, and to Austria, the Czech Republic and Hungary where he performed Vaughan Williams' Dona Nobis Pacem with the Mendelssohn Chamber Orchestra. In recital he recently performed Wolf’s Italienisches Liederbuch at various London venues and was involved in a series of American Song in the Duke’s Hall. William was a member of the Steans' Institute for Young Artists at the Ravinia Festival in Chicago, USA where he studied with Barbara Bonney and Håkan Hagegard. Other masterclasses have included Malcolm Martineau, Philip Langridge, Bob Tear, Thomas Hampson and the Young Songmakers 2002 with Graham Johnson. He has also worked with Sir David Willcocks, Nicholas McGegan and Michael Tilson Thomas.

Future engagements include a return to Göttingen as Zebul in Handel's Jeptha with The English Concert, a concert performance of Bellini’s Beatrice di Tenda and singing Papageno in The Magic Flute for British Youth Opera. William would like to thank the Ernest Oppenheimer Memorial Trust in South Africa, the Musicians Benevolent Fund and the Countess of Munster Musical Trust for their generous support.