Pittsburgh native Benjamin Werley— praised as having a “gleaming, fliexible tenor” (Opera News)—was first bitten by the opera bug while attending a performance of Puccini’s Tosca. He has been pursuing an operatic career ever since.
A graduate of the Jacob’s School of Music at Indiana University, Werley was one of twenty singers nationwide selected to sing in the semi-finals of the 2012-2013 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions in New York City. He has since participated in many prestigious young artist programs, including the Merola Opera Program, Santa Fe Opera, Florida Grand Opera, Virginia Opera, Opera Colorado, Opera Theatre of St. Louis, and Martina Arroyo’s Prelude to Performance. During that time, he sang Don Ottavio in Mozart's Don Giovanni (Merola), Farmer in the world premiere of The Scarlet Letter by Lori Laitman (Opera Colorado), Courier in Puccini's La Fanciulla del West and Deiner 3 in Strauss's Capriccio. (Santa Fe Opera), Don José in Carmen (Martina Arroyo’s Prelude to Performance), Arturo in Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor and Narraboth in Strauss’s Salome (Florida Grand Opera). He has also been a soloist with the Dayton Philharmonic, Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, The Western Piedmont Symphony, and the Queens Symphony Orchestra.
In the 2019-2020 season, Werley returned to Virginia Opera in their first ever production of Kurt Weil’s Street Scene. He then made his Cleveland Opera Theater and role debut as Alfredo in La traviata in April, and made his debut that summer at Central City Opera as Red Whiskers in their production of Britten’s Billy Budd, in which he also covered Captain Vere. He then joined Salt Marsh Opera for his role and company debut as Canio in Pagliacci, and company debuts with St. Pete Opera as il Duca (Rigoletto). Upcoming performances include a filmed version of Mark Adamo’s Lysistrata with Pittsburgh Festival Opera and a return to Don Ottavio in Indianapolis Opera’s Don Giovanni this fall.
