At the tender age of 23, baritone David O’Donnell is preparing his sixth operatic role. He performed roles one through five on local stages, with such groups as Messiah College and Harrisburg Opera.
Number six — John Brook in Mark Adamo’s Little Women — premiered in Belgium this summer, with the Intermezzo Foundation’s Elardo Young Artist Program.
“I’m going to Europe, and I’m getting to sing a role in a European theater,” O’Donnell said before he left the States. “That’s a great thing to have on your résumé.”
The Carlisle native and Messiah graduate, son of Jack and Kathy O’Donnell, is earning a master’s degree at Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York. He started singing at 15, taking lessons with Carlisle’s living legend, Joan Boytim. He also studied violin with Harrisburg Symphony Orchestra concertmaster Odin Rathnam.
O’Donnell grew up with classical music — as a young boy, he’s told, he would “co-conduct” the church choir that his mother directed — and his teachers taught him to appreciate music as a gift.
“We have to give to an audience,” O’Donnell says. “You can keep music for yourself, but if you really have a talent, you need to share that talent. You can’t just practice and try to be perfect, because you can never achieve perfection. You have to share it with people.”
In coming years, O’Donnell’s voice could shift upward into the tenor range, Plácido Domingo–style. But he prefers the personality fit with baritone roles, such as the rascally title character in Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi.
“I like to be able to go away from music and do other things, like play sports or go out in the woods,” he says. “Baritones are supposed to be the guys that eat burgers and pizza. They go to football games.”
Here are two samples of David's performances. They are both from the song cycle Songs of Travel by Ralph Vaughan Williams, poetry by Robert Louis Stevenson:
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