An opening statement
I am a baritone. The work is rooted in the operatic repertoire and in Lieder.
Trained at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.
In the voice this cycle: Kecal in Bel Canto Hong Kong's Bartered Bride; the lead in Toy Factory's Moonlit City this August, playing Lee Kuan Yew; and Third Prizes at the 2025 Romania–Japan and China–ASEAN International Vocal Competitions.
Alongside the operatic core, a small Chinese-language songwriting project under the name 陈禾丰.
男中音。工作以歌剧与艺术歌曲(Lieder)为根基。 毕业于伊利诺伊大学厄巴纳-香槟分校与旧金山音乐学院。 本轮周期:Bel Canto Hong Kong《被卖的新娘》Kecal 一角; 八月在 Toy Factory《月光城》主演,饰李光耀; 2025 罗马尼亚—日本与中国—东盟国际声乐比赛皆获季军。 另有一个小型华语原创项目,署名陈禾丰。
“The work is not to sound finished. The work is to keep becoming.” From a rehearsal notebook · 2026
In the voice now
Roles taken in staged and semi-staged productions. Each one has earned its place in the voice before it was added here.
A role that rewards plain diction and honest character more than vocal display. The bird-catcher is a test of timing, and of how much the baritone can say without lifting the line.
Bel canto agility brought into conversational immediacy. The long patter lines are an exercise in control; the duets are an exercise in generosity.
A role that asks for weight without distortion. The menace has to live inside the tone, not at its edges.
With Bel Canto Hong Kong in 2026, Smetana's Bartered Bride was reimagined in 1960s Hong Kong, and Kecal, the village marriage-broker, became the 媒婆: the lady matchmaker of mid-century Hong Kong, fan in hand, bag over arm, doing the small work of arranging other people's lives.
The role is basso buffo at heart. Patter, comic timing, dramatic weight underneath the laughter. The cultural translation only sharpens it.
Dandini (La Cenerentola), Le Dancaïro (Carmen, 2019), Apollo (L'Egisto), Demetrius (A Midsummer Night's Dream), Podestà (Le Docteur Miracle), Timur (Turandot), John Brooke (Little Women), Der Zwerg (2019). With Singapore Lyric Opera: Belcore (L'elisir d'amore), Ramfis (Aida), Mandarin (Turandot).
Listen · 聆听
Two operatic arias, in their working state. These are live recordings, captured on a phone during performance, so please don't expect studio polish. They are records of the voice as it sounded that night, in that room.
Selection 01 · Korngold
From the 2016 Singapore Lyric Opera ASEAN Vocal Competition, where this was the winning piece (Third Prize, Best Singaporean Artist). The Straits Times described the tone that evening as "rich, burnished."
Listen · 聆听
Selection 02 · Handel
Harapha's defiance: a Handel oratorio aria that asks for architecture and bravado in equal measure. The leaps are meant to read as scorn, not as effort.
Listen · 聆听
Recital
Recital is not a side practice. It is where the voice learns to carry a whole room on the thread of a single text.
The documented anchor of the Lieder strand. A Schubert recital on a concert-hall stage that set the direction for everything that has followed: Schumann, Wolf, Brahms, and a complete Dichterliebe in preparation.
Recital · sacred song
A setting of the Marian prayer, held inside the long line of sacred-music repertoire that runs through the oratorio practice and, in chamber configuration, through the Vox Sacra Duo. The aim is reverence, not display.
Listen · 聆听
Recital · Lieder
Schubert's quietest Lied. The Matthäus von Collin text moves between the night and the dreams it brings; the music sits at the edge of pianissimo for the long arc of its single phrase. A test of poise rather than projection.
Listen · 聆听
Recital · Lieder
A Stolberg poem set as a barcarolle: time slipping past like water. The piano rocks underneath, the voice rides the surface. Lighter in atmosphere than the darker Lieder, and no easier to hold.
Listen · 聆听
Oratorio & orchestral song
Oratorio is the baritone's civic repertoire. It comes back with the calendar, and it teaches the voice something different each time.
The foundational sacred-repertoire outing. Returns each season and teaches the voice something different every year, about line, about diction, about the restraint of sacred declamation.
A setting of Whitman that asks the voice to speak as much as sing, and to hold the tempo of grief for its full arc.
Britten's Fantasia on Christmas Carols, Beethoven's Choral Fantasy Op. 80, St. George in Rutter's Reluctant Dragon, Fauré Requiem, Brahms Ein deutsches Requiem, and Orff Carmina Burana.
Alongside solo oratorio engagements, I sing sacred-music repertoire in chamber configuration as part of Vox Sacra Duo, a small project dedicated to the sacred-music line of the classical tradition. Visit the Vox Sacra Duo site →
Competitions & awards
A first concrete step onto the international operatic page. Entered here as evidence, not as a trophy.
Regional recognition in the year the bilingual identity came forward most clearly.
From the National Association of Teachers of Singing.
Alongside the Shell Foundation Bursary (Singapore NAC) and an NDTV Honorary (New York).
A portrait
The photography on this site is documentary by policy. Rehearsal rooms, score in hand, backstage moments. No studio-lit heroics, no lifestyle gloss. The aim is a record of the working voice, not a campaign for it.
影像 · A small gallery
A short editorial selection. Three studio portraits in black-and-white, three in cinematic colour.
