Russell Thomas Commands the Cover of Opera Now • January 2024
London, United Kingdom
Photo by LaJoy Photography
Opera Now
Breaking Barriers
“Redefining industry norms with his work on-and off-stage, tenor Russell Thomas shares how he is channelling trauma into powerful art to inspire and heal.
If you could invite anyone to dinner who would it be? For two pins I can guess tenor Russell Thomas would say Wagner and Nina Simone. ‘Huge fan of Nina Simone – her musicality, her advocacy, and how she created her own path,’ reads his website. And so planning for an interview in which so many powerful influences and devotions relate to the artist at hand was simultaneously daunting and thrilling.
But quickly once we sat down and began chatting I knew my research was largely redundant. Thomas has gripping conviction and a musical personality of activism. Ringing through my ears remains the key take-away: ‘People are comfortable with people that look like them’..”