Robert Tear

Robert Tear was born in Barry, South Wales, in March 1939 and read music at King’s College, Cambridge, where he was a choral scholar under David Willcocks. He made his début with the English Opera Group in 1963 and joined the Royal Opera House Covent Garden as a principal tenor in 1970.

His central repertoire combined the contemporary British operatic and concert works in which he became a leading specialist with the standard lyric and character tenor parts of the Italian, Mozart and Strauss operatic stage. He created roles in operas by Britten (the Madwoman in *Curlew River*, the Younger Son in *The Prodigal Son*, the Painter in *Death in Venice*), Tippett (Achilles in the Covent Garden revival of *King Priam*), Maxwell Davies, Maw, Bennett and Henze, and was the central British tenor of the new-music scene of the 1970s and 1980s. His Mozart roles included Don Ottavio, Ferrando, Tamino, and the title role in *Idomeneo*; his Strauss roles included the Captain in *Wozzeck* (Berg) and the Painter in *Lulu*; his concert and oratorio repertoire was extensive across the Bach Passions, the Handel oratorios, and the major British choral repertoire.

Tear was appointed CBE in 1984 and was also a notable conductor of the London Mozart Players and other British ensembles in his later career. He died in London in March 2011. Music Preserved’s archive includes a range of his Britten, contemporary and operatic work.