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While a pupil at Ysgol Glantaf he was awarded a county scholarship to take lessons at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama. He then went to The Queen's College, Oxford to read Physics as a Styring Exhibitioner. During this period he won several prizes at the National Eisteddfod of Wales, and, having returned to Ysgol Glantaf as a teacher, he then grasped the nettle of a full-time singing career by accepting a place on the postgraduate course at the Royal Academy of Music, London where he was awarded the Hubert Kiver Prize. He subsequently trained at the National Opera Studio in London, where he was supported by Welsh National Opera and the Friends of Covent Garden.
Paul's operatic roles for major companies include Scarpia Tosca for Northern Ireland Opera, Fiorello Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Haly L'Italiana in Algeri, Marchese d'Obigny La Traviata and Schimdt Andrea Chenier for Scottish Opera, Marcello La Bohème for Scottish Opera on Tour, Andy Warhol Jackie O for the Teatro Rossini, Lugo and the Teatro Comunale di Bologna, Gasparo Rita (Donizetti), First Comrade Der Silbersee (Weill), Eurymaque Pénélope (Fauré), Martino L'Occasione Fa Il Ladro (Rossini) for Wexford Festival Opera. Other roles for smaller companies include Papageno Die Zauberflöte, Don Giovanni and Masetto Don Giovanni, Guglielmo and Don Alfonso Così Fan Tutte, Figaro Le Nozze di Figaro, Osmin Zaïde, Donner Das Rheingold, Figaro Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Alidoro Cenerentola, Schaunard La Bohème, Count Ceprano Rigoletto, Escamillo Carmen, Dr Malatesta Don Pasquale, The Forester The Cunning Little Vixen, Lawrence The Wreckers, Bartolo Il Barbiere di Siviglia (Paisiello), John Styx Orpheus in the Underworld, Sam Trouble in Tahiti, Monsieur Juste The Three Wishes, and Tom the Coachman The Little Sweep.
In contemporary opera Paul has created the roles of Freddie Jesson in Peter Wiegold’s Brief Encounter, Paracelsus the Alchemist in Jonathan Owen Clark’s Hidden States, Mohammed in Keith Burstein's Manifest Destiny, and Media Man in Jonathan Dove's Man on the Moon. He has also performed the roles of Blazes and Officer 2 in Peter Maxwell Davies' The Lighthouse, in a production at the Cantiere Internazionale d'Arte di Montepulciano which was broadcast live worldwide by RAI3, performed the eleven roles for baritone in Stephen Oliver's A Man of Feeling, covered the role of Richard Nixon in Nixon in China and Jaufré Rudel in L'Amour de Loin for English National Opera, and covered the roles of Billy and Deputy Mayor in Anna Nicole for the Royal Opera, Covent Garden.
Paul has an extensive concert
repertoire, having performed across the UK and Europe, and on many
broadcasts on regional and national television and radio, including BBC
Radio 3's In Tune and BBC Radio 2's Friday Night is Music Night. His
oratorio performances cover more than fifty major works, including
Mendelssohn's Elijah, Handel's Messiah, Haydn's Creation,
Bach's
John and Matthew Passions and Mass in B minor, Orff's Carmina
Burana, and the Requiems
by Mozart, Brahms, Fauré, Duruflé and Salieri. In
February 2004 he gave the UK premiere of Galuppi's recently
rediscovered motet, Confitebor Tibi Domine, and was the
baritone soloist in the world premieres of Richard
Elfyn Jones' In David's Land at St David's Cathedral in 2006, and Stephen McNeff's Cities
of Dreams at the Brangwyn Hall, Swansea in 2007.
In 2002 he was accompanied by the London Symphony Orchestra under the
baton of Seiji Ozawa at a concert celebrating the 75th birthday of the
cellist Mstislav Rostropovich, held at Buckingham Palace.
As a recitalist, Paul has performed
world premieres of songs by Richard Elfyn Jones, David Power, Emily
Hall, David
Lancaster, Dick Blackford, Mike Parkin and Jonathan Owen Clark. His
debut song album, ENAID
-
Songs of the Soul, with the pianist Llyr Williams, was
released by Sain in 2007. His recent recital highlights include
Schubert's Winterreise at
the Machynlleth Festival with Llyr Williams.
As a recording artist he also appears
as
Squire Alworthy on Naxos' 2009
disc of Edward German's Tom Jones,
and as Andy Warhol in
Michael Daugherty's Jackie O
for Dynamic DVD. His latest album
is due for release in Spring 2012 on the Cadenza label.
Paul was a member of the late Yehudi
Menuhin's 'Live Music Now!'
scheme, for whom he gave over 200 concerts.
In 2001 he was awarded the National Eisteddfod of Wales' most
prestigious prize for young singers, the W.Towyn
Roberts Scholarship, adding his name to a list of winners that
includes Rhys Meirion, Leah Marian Jones, Elizabeth Donovan and Bryn
Terfel. Paul also appears as an audition panel member, competition
adjudicator and gives masterclasses, notably with Live Music Now, the
Newcastle Emlyn Eisteddfod, and for the Bryn Terfel
Scholarship.
Paul is a shareholder at Cardiff City Football Club,
where he has sung live during the pre-match build-up, a member of Glamorgan
County
Cricket Club, and is the offical Bard to the Committee of
the
Lemmings Cricket Club.
His other hobbies include teaching mathematics and physics, and
crosswords and quizzes: in 1999 he captained the Royal Academy of
Music's pioneering team on the BBC's
University
Challenge television quiz show.
The latest information on his career and forthcoming appearances is always available online at www.paulcareyjones.com