Brian Skoog
Chicago-based American tenor Brian Skoog is known for his “vocal power” (San Diego Story) and “fine lyric tenor” (Toledo Blade). In the summer of 2023, he will make his role debut as Tempo in Handel’s Il trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno with Opera Neo in San Diego, California. Skoog also appears this season as Mozart in Rimsky-Korsakov’s Mozart and Salieri with The Cleveland Opera and covers the role of Normanno in Lucia di Lammermoor with Druid City Opera. This season, Skoog gives concert performances of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Briggs’s Requiem, Michael Haydn’s Requiem, Mozart’s Coronation Mass, Mozart’s Requiem, and two performances of Handel’s Messiah. He also appears as a special guest of the Cleveland Women’s Orchestra. Recent seasons include operatic roles with Central City Opera, The Cleveland Opera, Cleveland Opera Theater, Dayton Opera, Nashville Opera, Opera Fayetteville, Opera Neo, Pensacola Opera, Toledo Opera, and Utah Festival Opera.
Skoog is an active performer of oratorio and concert work across the United States. This season, he joins the Toledo Symphony for Handel’s Messiah and Mozart’s Requiem, both under the baton of Alain Trudel. In recent seasons, Skoog has appeared as a repeat soloist with the Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra, performing Handel’s Messiah as well as music by Bach and Beethoven. In 2020, Skoog performed Benjamin Britten’s Serenade for Tenor, Horn, and Strings with the Heights Chamber Orchestra. A champion of new music and living composers, Skoog was recently the tenor soloist for the world premiere of Margaret Brouwer’s environmental oratorio Voice of the Lake. Seen and Heard International praised his “brilliant” singing and called him “one of the highlights.” His performance of “The Lake” was included on a 2022 album of Brouwer’s compositions on the Naxos label. In 2022, he gave the world premier of the song cycle “Quarantine Poems for Tenor and Three Bassoons” by Ryan Charles Ramer, a studio recording of which will be released in 2023.
A native of Birmingham, Alabama, Brian Skoog received his Bachelor of Music from the University of Alabama and his Master of Music and post-graduate certificate from the Cleveland Institute of Music. After graduation, he trained at the Aspen Opera Theater Center, Central City Opera, Dayton Opera, Nashville Opera, Pensacola Opera, and Toledo Opera.