Wei Wu

Grammy Award-winning bass Wei Wu trained at Washington National Opera’s Cafritz Young Artist program, the People’s University of China, Beijing, and the University of Colorado at Boulder, who recently presented him with the Kalpana Chawla Outstanding Recent Graduate Award.

The 2024-25 season was full of exciting returns for Wu. He began the season with Los Angeles Opera, singing both Frère Laurent in Roméo et Juliette and the Bonze in Madama Butterfly. He then bowed with Austin Opera in Verdi’s Messa da Requiem, debuted with the Shanghai Symphony as Sparafucile in Rigoletto, and brought his celebrated portrayal of Kōbun in The Revolution of Steve Jobs to Washington National Opera. Future seasons include his debut with the Finnish National Opera.

The bass’s 2023-24 season brought notable house debuts, as Kōbun with San Francisco Opera, and as Zuniga in a new production of Bizet’s Carmen with the Metropolitan Opera. During the summer, he returned to Bard Summerscape as Mathisen in Meyerbeer’s Le prophète.

Other engagements for Wu have included his debut with Los Angeles Opera as Angelotti in Tosca; Frère Laurent in Roméo et Juliette at Central City Opera; Sparafucile in Rigoletto with Opera Philadelphia; Hunding in Act 1 of Die Walküre with New Orleans Opera; Marv Carson in A Thousand Acres (world premiere); Snug the Joiner in Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, both for Des Moines Metro Opera; and performances of Kōbun with Calgary Opera, Utah Opera, Austin Opera, and Lyric Opera of Kansas City.

Wu created the role of Kōbun Chino Otogawa in the world premiere performances of The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs at Santa Fe Opera, and appears on the live cast recording, which was released by Pentatone and won best opera recording at the 2019 Grammy Awards. His notable operatic engagements include Sarastro (Die Zauberflöte), Don Basilio (Il barbiere di Siviglia), Colline (La bohème), and Lodovico (Otello) with Washington National Opera; Arnold “Chick” Gandil in the world premiere of Joel Puckett’s The Fix with Minnesota Opera; the Four Villains (Les contes d’Hoffmann), Don Basilio, and the Old Hebrew (Samson et Dalila) at the NCPA Beijing; Timur (Turandot), and Father Trulove (The Rake’s Progress) with Pittsburgh Opera; the Nephew in Blood Moon with the PROTOTYPE Festival; and Phanuel (Hérodiade) as well as the Ghost of Nino (Semiramide) with Washington Concert Opera.

On the symphonic stage, he has performed with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra as Rocco in Fidelio, conducted by Manfred Honeck, the Kansas City Symphony, for Mozart’s Requiem led by Michael Stern, and has sung Verdi’s Requiem with The Orchestra Now and the West Virginia Symphony.