Meet Dafydd Allen, WNO Associate Artist

Welsh baritone Dafydd Allen is one of Welsh National Opera’s two new Associate Artists for 2022/2023. A graduate of the Royal College of Music (RCM) in London, Dafydd was previously a member of WNO Youth Opera, performing in Peter Maxwell Davies’s Kommilitonen! at Barry Memo Arts Centre in July 2016.

Kommilitonen! was directed by another recipient of WNO’s ongoing commitment to new talent; WNO Genesis Assistant Director, Polly Graham, who Dafydd collaborated with for RCM Opera Studio’s production of The Magic Flute, where he performed the role of Speaker.

Dafydd has performed various other roles at RCM including Father in Hansel and Gretel; Dancaïre in Carmen and Demetrius in A Midsummer Night’s Dream as part of the college’s Opera Scenes; Masetto in Don Giovanni for OPRA Cymru and William Minnock in the world premiere of Madeleine by David Hackridge Johnson with Surrey Opera.

He started his appointment as WNO Associate Artist by performing extracts from 2117 / Hedd Wyn with soprano Ellen Williams at the CD launch of the brand-new Welsh language opera commissioned by WNO. Dafydd formed part of the chorus on the 2017 recording. Held at the National Eisteddfod in Ceredigion, the CD launch did not mark his first visit to the Eisteddfod; Dafydd has frequently sung in competitions (and been a prize winner) at both the National Eisteddfod of Wales and the Urdd Eisteddfod.

As part of our Autumn Season, he will be making his main stage debut in the roles of Stage Technician / Doctor in our new production of Janáček’s The Makropulos Affair as well as continuing his association with WNO Youth Opera, playing Boris in Cherry Town, Moscow. Dafydd then kicks off the new year in style, singing in WNO Orchestra’s Return to Vienna concert, which is touring across Wales and southern England between 5 and 21 January 2023.