Barry McDaniel

American lyric baritone Barry McDaniel was born in Lyndon, Kansas on 18 October 1930, and studied singing, piano and percussion from the age of nine. After studies at the University of Kansas, he became a student of Mack Harrell at Juilliard.

He went to Germany on a Fulbright scholarship in 1953, studying German and French art song with Alfred Paulus and Hermann Reutter at Musikhochschule Stuttgart.

In a career based mostly in Germany, he worked at Staatstheater Mainz, Staatsoper Stuttgart, Staatstheater Karlsruhe and then for more than thirty-five years at Deutsche Oper Berlin, also demonstrating great versatility in oratorio and recitals. His melifluous voice could be heard from time to time in Austria, Belgium, Japan, Mexico, The Netherlands, Scotland, Switzerland and the USA, and he broadcast art songs for Swiss Radio, the BBC and various German public radio stations. There are also many recordings, demonstrating his wide repertoire, from Bach to Boulez.

McDaniel lived in Berlin, where he died on 18 June 2018, aged eighty-seven.