Tenor James Ruff is comfortable in a wide variety of music on both the concert and operatic stage. He has sung as soloist with the Handel & Haydn Society in such works as Bach's Christmas Oratorio, St. Matthew Passion, and Charpentier's Messe de Minuit. James has also excelled in performances of twentieth-century choral works such as Britten's St. Nicolas and Orff's Carmina Burana.
Recent concert engagements include Couperin's Leçons de Tenebres at Boston College, Handel's Chandos Anthems with Albany Pro Musica, an all-Byrd program with The King's Noyse, Messiah with the Arcadia Players, the J. S. Bach and C. P. E. Bach Magnificats with the Hampshire Chorale, the Steffani Stabat Mater with NYS Baroque, and Carmina Burana at Amherst College.
His operatic roles include Ferrando in Cosi fan tutte, Fenton in The Merry Wives of Windsor and Dov in the East Coast premiere of Tippett's The Knot Garden (at Boston University), Tamino in The Magic Flute and Pelleas. Mr. Ruff has received particular praise for his singing of Paris in La Belle Helene, as well as the high-lying Rossini tenor roles in such operas as Le Comte Ory, L'Italiana in Algeri, and Il Turco in Italia, which he has sung (and covered) at Glimmerglass Opera, Canadian Opera Company, The Boston Academy of Music, Lowell House Opera at Harvard, and as guest artist at Boston University.
Mr. Ruff's recent operatic performances include his portrayal of the singing/dancing Western Union Boy in Britten's Paul Bunyan at New York City Opera, televised nationally on PBS: Live from Lincoln Center, and the role of Mengone in Haydn's Lo Speziale with the Orchestra of St. Luke's.
Following vocal study at the University of Southern California and Boston University, James participated in the Young Artist Programs of Glimmerglass Opera and the Opera Theatre of St. Louis, and studied art song repertoire at Tanglewood and the Steans Institute of the Ravinia Festival (with Thomas Hampson and Peter Schreier). He also attended the Britten-Pears School in Aldeburgh, England, where he studied bel canto operatic repertoire with Joan Sutherland and Richard Bonynge.