Tenor
World
Puerto Rican tenor Rafael Dávila is an established international artist whose career spans more than three decades and encompasses more than sixty leading roles at many of the world’s major opera houses and festivals. His career has taken him to the Metropolitan Opera, Gran Teatre del Liceu de Barcelona, San Francisco Opera, Palau de les Arts Valencia, Teatro Colón de Buenos Aires, Teatro San Carlo di Napoli, Lyric Opera of Chicago, among numerous other leading companies in North America, Europe, and Latin America.
He has built a repertoire firmly rooted in the Italian and French spinto and dramatic tenor traditions, including roles as Radamès in Aida, Cavaradossi in Tosca, Calaf in Turandot, Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly, Andrea Chénier, Manrico in Il trovatore, Otello, Don Alvaro in La forza del destino, Don Carlo, Samson in Samson et Dalila, Johnson in La fanciulla del West.
Dávila has maintained a significant relationship with the Metropolitan Opera, where he made his debut as Don José in Carmen in 2017 and subsequently performed leading roles in seceral productions as Don Carlo, Aida, Medea, and Nabucco. In the 2026–27 season he appears as Macduff in the new production of Macbeth conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin, and cover of Radames and Cavaradossi.
His international career has included important debuts and engagements in Puccini and verismo repertoire, including Des Grieux in Manon Lescaut with San Francisco Opera, the Gran Teatre del Liceu and Palau de les Arts; Cavalleria rusticana and Pagliacci at Teatro San Carlo and Macerata Opera Festival.
Dávila has also maintained an active concert career, performing works including Verdi’s Messa da Requiem, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde, Rossini’s Stabat Mater, Bach’s Magnificat, Mozart’s Requiem and Coronation Mass, and Estévez’s Cantata Criolla.
Deeply connected to the Hispanic musical tradition, he has performed leading roles in zarzuelas including Luisa Fernanda, Marina, Los gavilanes, El huésped del sevillano, María la O, and Cecilia Valdés.
A graduate of the Conservatory of Music of Puerto Rico, Dávila earned a Master’s degree in Opera Performance from the University of Texas at Austin. He is a two-time Grammy Award nominee for recordings of Ariel Ramírez’s Misa Criolla and Rafael Hernández’s Cofresí.
LATEST PERFORMANCES: Macbeth at Metropolitan Opera New York under the baton of Yannick Nézet-Séguin; Cavalleria rusticana and Pagliacci at Teatro Municipal de Lima; Carmen at Teatro Sodre de Montevideo, Florida Grand Opera and Teatro Colon de Buenos Aires; Cavalleria rusticana in Pittsburgh.
FORTHCOMING PROJECTS:Samson et Dalila at Opera de Puerto Rico; Il trovarore (Manrico) at New Orleans Opera; Cavalleria rusticana at La Monnaie in Brussels.
