Impressive in his low range, Allen Boxer’s baritone voice embodies Golaud, a virile hunter carried away by fiery jealousy. He easily soars through his upper range, enriching his character with a polished fragility, accentuated by a warm timbre and skillful technique.”
-Chloë Delös-Eray, for Pelléas et Mélisande (Paris – 2023)
“Allen Boxer gives a superb, particularly endearing Golaud. His sound is large, appropriately dark, trenchant, worrying, painful and intense with extreme violence. His diction is matched by his beautiful legato and ideal projection. A great singer, whose radiant maturity promises a great career.”
-Yvan Beuvard, for Pelléas et Mélisande (Montpellier – 2022)
Allen Boxer recently stepped in last-minute to make his début as Golaud in Pelléas et Mélisande with the Orchestre National de Paris, under the baton of Susanna Mälkki. His season opened with an appearance at the AFEKT contemporary music festival in Tallinn in a performance of Atara, by leading contemporary composer Chaya Czernowin. In the winter, he assumed an adjunct professorship at the prestigious Cincinnati Conservatory of Music. April sees his debuts as Bass Soloist in both Haydn’s Lord Nelson Mass and Bach’s Matthäuspassion with the Armenian National Philharmonic Orchestra in Yerevan, before traveling to Italy to perform Stravinsky’s Les Noces in the original Russian with the Teatro Regio di Parma. He continues his season covering the lead role in Wozzeck under the baton of Sir Simon Rattle with Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, and then it’s off to the Wexford Festival to make his debut as John Buckley in Tutino’s Two Women. Last season, Allen made his debut with the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma, playing three different roles in the world premiere of Giorgio Battistelli’s Julius Caesar, directed by Robert Carsen. He made his house debut in Montpellier as Golaud in Pelléas et Mélisande, and then he traveled to Metz to perform a set of Schubert lieder with the composer/pianist Brice Pauset. His summer was spent singing the Erster Soldat in Salome—directed by Andrea Breth—and covering Virgilio in the world premiere of Dusapin’s Il viaggio, Dante with the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence.
During the 2020-2021 season, Allen performed the role of Hans in the premiere of a rarely presented Zemlinsky work, Der Traumgörge, with Opéra National de Lorraine and Opéra de Dijon, before moving on to Dresden to record Baron Douphol in La traviata with the Dresdner Philharmonie, under the baton of Daniel Oren. The season prior, Allen sang Robert Baker in Bernstein’s Wonderful Town with the Nederlandse Reisopera and Het Gelders Orkest, performed a New Year’s Eve Beethoven’s 9th in Halle and created the three-in-one leading role in the world premiere of Brice Pauset’s Strafen with Opéra de Dijon.
As a member of Semperoper Dresden’s Junges Ensemble from 2011-2013, Allen sang numerous roles, including Dandini (La cenerentola), Masetto (Don Giovanni), Angelotti (Tosca) and Baron Douphol. He continues to make regular appearances with the Semperoper Dresden, where in the last several seasons he has joined the casts of Die Zauberflöte, La forza del destino, Giulio Cesare in Egitto, Pelléas et Mélisande and Die Lustige Witwe. In prior seasons, Allen covered the lead role in Le pavillon d’Or in Strasbourg, appeared in Dresden as the 3. Student von Krakow (Doktor Faust) and debuted Stephen Crowe’s world premiere techno-opera Pterodactyls of Ptexas in Berlin. Other roles include Schaunard (La Bohème), Spencer Coyle (Owen Wingrave), Frank (Die Tote Stadt), Figaro (Le nozze di Figaro – in Italian and German), Dr. Grenvil (La traviata) and Collatinus (The Rape of Lucretia)—with both Lorin Maazel’s Castleton Festival and Aldeburgh’s Britten-Pears Programme.
