Philippe Sly

One of the most promising Canadian bass-baritones of his generation, Philippe Sly is a graduate of McGill University in Montreal. He went on to further his training as a member of the Canadian Opera Company’s Ensemble Studio and subsequently the San Francisco Opera’s Merola Program. He also participated in the Banff Centre for the Arts’ young artist program for three consecutive years.

Philippe Sly has won numerous major awards, including first prize at the Montreal International Musical Competition, the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions in 2011, the Young Soloist Prize from the Radios francophones publiques, and the Brian Law Opera Scholarship in Ottawa in 2010. That same year, he was a scholarship recipient of the Jacqueline Desmarais Foundation for young Canadian opera singers.

He made his professional stage debut with the Canadian Opera Company in Toronto (in Les Contes d’Hoffmann, Gianni Schicchi, and Iphigénie en Tauride), followed by an appearance at the Salzburg Festival in Winter’s Das Labyrinth under the baton of Ivor Bolton. His operatic career subsequently developed rapidly. He made a highly acclaimed debut at the San Francisco Opera in Così fan tutte (as Guglielmo) under Nicola Luisotti, a role he later reprised with the Los Angeles Philharmonic and Gustavo Dudamel. In San Francisco, he also sang Bartolo in Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Ormonte in Partenope, and Figaro in Le Nozze di Figaro.

In concert, Philippe Sly has appeared as a guest soloist with numerous orchestras. Notable performances include Bach’s St. Matthew Passion with the Orchestre Métropolitain (conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin) and the Dallas Symphony Orchestra (conducted by Jaap van Zweden), Messiah, La Damnation de Faust, L’Aiglon, and Pelléas et Mélisande (as Golaud) conducted by Kent Nagano with the Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal, Fauré’s Requiem (conducted by Alain Altinoglu), St. Matthew Passion, Handel’s Messiah, and Mozart’s Mass in C minor (conducted by Nézet-Séguin) with the Philadelphia Orchestra, Fauré’s Requiem with the Orchestre Symphonique de Québec and the Minnesota Orchestra, Ein deutsches Requiem, the Christmas Oratorio, St. Matthew Passion, and Messiah in Ottawa, Messiah and Mozart’s Requiem with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Handel’s Solomon and St. John Passion conducted by Bernard Labadie; Haydn’s Nelson Mass with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s, Handel’s Messiah with the Boston Handel and Haydn Society...

He also performed a program of opera arias with the Kuala Lumpur Philharmonic Orchestra in Malaysia, as well as a recital with pianist Michael McMahon.

Recent engagements include his Paris debut in Philippe Boesmans’s Au Monde at the Opéra Comique, as well as a Romeo Castellucci-staged version of St. Matthew Passion at the Sataatsoper Hamburg, Béatrice et Bénédict at the Glyndebourne Festival, Les Troyens with the Strasbourg Philharmonic Orchestra, Don Giovanni (title role) at the Aix-en-Provence Festival, the Opéra de Lyon, and the Opéra de Québec, Jephtha, Così fan tutte, Don Giovanni (Leporello), and The Exterminating Angel at the Paris Opera, Lakmé (Nilakantha) at the Opernhaus Zurich, Semele (Cadmus/Somnus) and Le Nozze di Figaro (Figaro) at the Bayerische Staatsoper, Julien Bilodeau’s La Reine garçon at the the Canadian Opera Company, Carmen (Escamillo) at the Opéra de Lausanne, Don Giovanni (Leporello), Le Nozze di Figaro (Figaro), and Kurtág’s Fin de partie at the Wiener Staatsoper, Pelléas et Mélisande (Arkel) with Opera Atelier, and Saint-François d’Assise (title role) at the Salzburger Festspiele…

In concert, he has recently performed Mozart’s Requiem and Kurt Weill’s Berliner Requiem with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra, the Christmas Oratorio with the Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal and at the Gulbenkian Foundation in Lisbon, Messiah with the University of Michigan Orchestra, the Orchestre Métropolitain, Victoria Symphony Orchestra, the Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra (Toronto), Cleveland Orchestra, St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, Mass in C minor with the Orchestre Métropolitain and the Orchestre Symphonique de Québec, St. John Passion with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s, Mozart’s Requiem with Les Violons du Roy, the National Arts Centre Orchestra and the Konzerthausorchester Berlin, St. Matthew Passion with the New York Philharmonic, Lord Nelson Mass with Boston Baroque…

Among his projects this season: Carmen (Escamillo) at the Wiener Staatsoper, Le Nozze di Figaro (Figaro) at the Bâtiment des Forces Motrices in Geneva, The Exterminating Angel at the Liceu in Barcelona, but also Haydn’s Schöpfung with the National Arts Centre Orchestra in Toronto.

His discography with Analekta includes two solo albums: In Dreams and Love’s Minstrels: English Songs from the 19th and 20th Centuries, and a recording of Rameau cantatas titled Les Amants trahis (with Hélène Guilmette and Luc Beauséjour), it also features a Decca recording of L’Aiglon with the Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal conducted by Kent Nagano, a Deutsche Grammophon recording of Le Nozze di Figaro conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin (recorded at the Baden-Baden Festival), and a Warner Classics recording of Les Troyens with the Orchestre Symphonique de Strasbourg conducted by John Nelson.

September 2026

^{This biography should not be edited without permission from Intermezzo.}