During the 2023-24 season, British-American tenor Joshua Blue makes his Houston Grand Opera stage debut creating the role of Wilson in the world premiere of  Intelligence, a new work from composer Jake Heggie and librettist Gene Scheer, conducted by Kwamé Ryan. He will return to the Metropolitan Opera as Tamino for Julie Taymor’s production of The Magic Flute under the baton of Gareth Morrell. In concert, Mr. Blue will reunite with the American Symphony Orchestra and Leon Botstein for Dvořák’s Requiem at Carnegie Hall and Brahms’ Rinaldo at the Fisher Center at Bard; join the Oratorio Society of New York for a gala evening to celebrate their 150th anniversary with the final movement of Beethoven’s Symphony #9; performs Wendell Logan’s Runagate, Runagate with the Oberlin Sinfonietta; and sings Moravec’s Sanctuary Road with both the Bach Festival Society of Winter Park and Princeton Pro Musica. Mr. Blue will travel to Japan with the Royal Opera on tour covering the Duke in Rigoletto led by Music Director Antonio Pappano. He ends the season with Bard SummerScape celebrating Hector Berlioz by performing in the composers’ works: Lélio, Te Deum, and La Damnation de Faust.

Last season, Mr. Blue made his Los Angeles Philharmonic debut as the tenor soloist in Beethoven’s Symphony #9 performed at the Hollywood Bowl with Eva Ollikainen on the podium. He also returned to both the Metropolitan Opera to sing the Royal Herald in David McVicar’s production of Don Carlo under the baton of Carlo Rizzi and cover Chevalier de la Force in John Dexter’s production of Dialogues des Carmélites led by Bertrand de Billy as well as Opera Philadelphia to make his role debut as Rodolfo in the Yuval Sharon production of La bohème, a role he later reprised at the Glimmerglass Festival in the summer before joining the cast of Vaughan Williams’ Sir John in Love to sing Fenton as part of Bard’s SummerScape with Leon Botstein on the podium. Carnegie Hall appearances featured Handel’s Messiah with Musica Sacra and Beethoven’s Symphony #9 for the United Nations General Assembly. Additional concert debuts included the Cincinnati May Festival for Mozart’s Requiem conducted by James Conlon; American Symphony Orchestra performances of Ethel Smyth’s Mass in D led by Leon Botstein; and Temple University for Adolphus Hailstork’s Done Made My Vow. Mr. Blue also performed in the world-premiere of Another City, a new commission by Houston Grand Opera featuring composer Jeremy Howard Beck and librettist Stephanie Fleischmann.

Previously, Mr. Blue made multiple role and house debuts including the Metropolitan Opera as Peter in Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess for a revival of the Grammy Award-winning cast including Denyce Graves, Angel Blue, and Eric Owens; Los Angeles Opera singing the Evangelist in Bach’s St. Matthew Passion conducted by James Conlon with members of the Hamburg Ballet choreographed by John Neumeier; Opera Philadelphia as the Duke of Mantua in the Lindy Hume production of Rigoletto led by music director Corrado Rovaris; Virginia Opera as Loge in the Jonathan Dove reduction of Das Rheingold directed by Mary Birnbaum and conducted by Adam Turner; Berkshire Opera Festival as Don Ottavio in Don Giovanni led by Brian Garman; and the tenor soloist for Handel’s Messiah with the Philadelphia Orchestra and Beethoven’s Symphony #9 at the Lensic Performing Arts Center in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Mr. Blue also returned to Opera Theatre of Saint Louis as Tamino in The Magic Flute with stage direction by Omer Ben Seadia and conducted by Rory Macdonald. He also appeared at Carnegie Hall for The Ballad of the Brown King: A Christmas Cantata by Margaret Bonds with the Cecilia Chorus.

Additional career highlights include performing Act 1 of La bohème in concert with the National Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Gianandrea Noseda; Verdi’s Requiem with the Oratorio Society of New York at Carnegie Hall and the Cleveland Chamber Orchestra led by James Gaffigan; taking on the role of Tamino in the Maurice Sendak production of Mozart’s The Magic Flute with Washington National Opera and Eun Sun Kim on the podium; making his Kennedy Center debut as Alfredo in La Traviata directed by Francesca Zambello; traveling to Japan to cover the role of Monsieur Triquet in Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin conducted by Fabio Luisi and directed by Peter McClintock at the Seiji Ozawa Matsumoto Festival; joining conductor Michael Francis and The Florida Orchestra for Stravinsky’s opera-ballet Pulcinella which included projected paintings by Geff Strik and Tampa City Ballet dancers costumed by Veronique Carpio; returning to the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis to portray Rinuccio in Gianni Schicchi directed by Seán Curran and accompanied by members of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra with conductor Leonard Slatkin at the helm; recording Jeanine Tesori’s Blue for the Washington National Opera with Roderick Cox taking the conducting duties; singing the role of Harlekin in Ullmann’s Der Kaiser von Atlantis conducted by Geoffrey McDonald at Wolf Trap Opera; premiering Paul Moravec’s “Caltagirone” from A Nation of Others and a quartet reduction of “Much to be Done” from the 2019 work STONEWALL, both works have librettos by Mark Campbell, with the New York Festival of Song; performing the American premiere of the rarely heard Franz Liszt opera Sardanapalo at the Library of Congress; taking part in the Opening Festival of The REACH with performances of Beethoven’s Symphony #9 with the National Symphony Orchestra; singing in the American premiere of Philip Glass’s The Trial at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis; and performing the roles of Scaramuccio in Ariadne auf Naxos with Austin Opera and Nemorino in L’elisir d’amore with the Music Academy of the West.

In 2022, Mr. Blue was awarded the prestigious gift of The Mabel Dorn Reeder Foundation Prize by Opera Theatre of Saint Louis. He was the inaugural recipient of the Lotos Foundation’s James McCracken and Sandra Warfield Opera Prize in 2020; was a semi-finalist of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions in 2018; received the Ellen Lopin Blair award for 1st place in the 2017 Oratorio Society of New York solo competition; and was noted as an Emerging Artist in the 2017 Opera Index Competition in New York City. Mr. Blue appears on the recording of Moravec’s Sanctuary Road which was nominated for a 2021 Grammy Award and he provided vocals for the 2018 Oscar-nominated short film My Nephew Emmett.

Mr. Blue earned his bachelor’s degree from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music and graduated from The Juilliard School with a master’s degree, studying voice with Dr. Robert C. White, Jr. He is a former Apprentice Singer with Santa Fe Opera and is an alumnus of the Cafritz Young Artist program with the Washington National Opera.