William Towers

Counter-tenor

William Towers read English at Cambridge University and was a postgraduate scholar at the Royal Academy of Music where he was awarded several prizes. In his first year after leaving the Academy he appeared extensively as a soloist in Sir John Eliot Gardiner’s Bach Cantata Pilgrimage, including appearances in the Berlin Philharmonie, the Dijon Auditorium, the Metz Arsenal, Buckingham Palace and the final concerts in New York. His performances in the complete Bach Cantata series have been issued on CD.

His oratorio and recital schedule has featured appearances in many major venues and festivals in the UK and abroad, including the BBC Proms, with distinguished conductors such as Sir Roger Norrington, Paul McCreesh, Richard Hickox, Laurence Cummings, Emmanuelle Haïm, Barry Wordsworth, Stephen Layton and Jeffrey Skidmore. Orchestras he has worked with include the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, Bournemouth Symphony, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, City of London Sinfonia, Gabrieli Consort and Players, Monteverdi Choir and Orchestra, The Sixteen, Le Concert d’Astrée and Netherlands Bach Society. He has sung Orlando and Belshazzar in the US with Nicholas McGegan and Philharmonia Baroque.  He has often appeared with London Concert Choir, notably in Judas Maccabaeus and Bach’s St Matthew Passion.

His opera engagements have included roles at Royal Opera House Covent Garden, Teatro La Fenice Venice, Glyndebourne Festival, Oper Frankfurt, Göttingen Handel Festival, Gothenburg Opera, Linbury Theatre, La Monnaie Brussels, Aldeburgh Festival, Canadian Opera Company, National Theatre Prague, Bolshoi Theatre, Teatro Real Madrid, Bregenz Festival, Opera Theatre Company, London Handel Festival, Music Theatre Wales and at Grange Park.

His recordings include Handel’s Messiah, Purcell’s Fairy Queen, Bach’s St. Mark Passion and Orff’s Carmina Burana for BBC television.  

Current engagements include Unulfo in Rodelinda at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow, Voice of Apollo in Death in Venice for Staatstheater Stuttgart, as well as concerts with the Hanover Band, BBC Scottish Symphony and BBC National Orchestra of Wales.