Obituary for Ryan Smith, first-year Ryan Opera Center Ensemble Member

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Friday, Nov. 14, 2008

 

                                                                                    

 

Ryan Smith

December 15, 1976 – November 12, 2008

First-year Ensemble Member, Ryan Opera Center

Lyric Opera of Chicago

 

 

American tenor Ryan Smith, a first-year ensemble member of Lyric Opera of Chicago’s Patrick G. and Shirley W. Ryan Opera Center, died early Wednesday morning at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, of lymphoma. He was 31.

 

A native of Los Angeles who more recently lived in Atlanta, Smith auditioned in 2007 for the prestigious and highly selective Ryan Opera Center, the professional training program at Lyric Opera of Chicago. He was one of just seven young singers selected for the program’s 2008-09 season (from a field of 400), joining six second-year members of the ensemble.

 

Smith was a Grand Finals winner in the 2007 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. Before joining Lyric’s Ryan Opera Center, he made his Metropolitan Opera debut in March as Don Riccardo/Ernani (Verdi) with Marcello Giordani, Sondra Radvanovsky, Thomas Hampson, and Ferruccio Furlanetto, conducted by Roberto Abbado.

 

“Ryan Smith, as Rucker’s hapless son-in-law, sang with a clear tone and good projection — a young talent to watch,” wrote Pierre Ruhe in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution last February of the tenor’s Atlanta Opera portrayal of Camp Williams/Cold Sassy Tree (Floyd).

 

While still in high school, Smith spent the summer of 1994 at the Aspen Music Festival. An alumnus of Georgia’s Morehouse College, he earned his bachelor of music degree there and was featured in performances nationwide with the world-famous Morehouse Glee Club. He earned a master of music degree at Ohio University, where he portrayed Tamino/The Magic Flute (Mozart) and the title role/Albert Herring (Britten).

 

After finishing graduate school, Smith sang Ferrando/Così fan tutte (Mozart) with Studio Lirico, the summer opera program in Anghiari, Italy. Smith’s concert experience included works of Handel, Mendelssohn, Vaughan Williams, and Adolphus Hailstork. Dedicated to the study of African-American culture, Smith premiered Dr. Sharon Willis’s The Herndons with the Americolor Alliance Opera Guilds. He was heard at the Atlanta Opera (First Prisoner/Fidelio, Crab Man/Porgy and Bess, A Villager/Pagliacci) and Santa Fe Opera, where he was a 2007 apprentice and also portrayed Parpignol/La bohème.

 

Smith is survived by his parents Renee and Paul Smith and his sister Nya. There will be a private funeral next week in Los Angeles, and a memorial is planned in Atlanta after Thanksgiving. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that donations be made in Ryan’s memory to The Patrick G. and Shirley W. Ryan Opera Center at Lyric Opera of Chicago.

 

 

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