After reading Classics at St John’s College, Cambridge, British tenor Xavier Hetherington took his Master’s degree at the Royal College of Music as a Dr Prince Donatus and Princess Heidi Von Hohenzollern Scholar. He graduated in 2020 with Distinction and moved on to the Mascarade Opera Studio (MOS) in Florence, and then the Centre de Perfeccionament at the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofia in Valencia.
Recent and future engagements include the title role in Jonathan Dove's Itch (Opera Holland Park), Prologue/Peter Quint The Turn of the Screw (Deborah Warner Season at the Ustinov Studio, Bath), Brighella Ariadne auf Naxos (Nederlandse Reisopera), Nemorino The Elixir of Love and Lensky Eugene Onegin (Wild Arts including performances at Opera Holland Park), Don José Carmen (Waterperry Opera Festival); Scrofulous/Toady/Seer/Saul in a new Purcell/Pountney project Masque of Might, Dick Dauntless Ruddigore, Shepherd and cover Orpheus (Monteverdi) and Mini Vixen (all Opera North); Lieutenant Kotler in the World Premiere of A Child in Striped Pyjamas (Echo Ensemble); Shepherd "La liberazione Di Ruggiero Dall’isola D’Alcina" and cover Ferrando Cosí fan tutte (Longborough Festival); Lensky, Tebaldo I Capuleti e i Montecchi and Don Ramiro La Cenerentola in a scenes showcase at La Fenice; and the trio from Bernstein’s Trouble in Tahiti at the Palau de les Arts, Valencia.
Recent concert performances include Pilade Ermione (The Monteverdi Choir), Ahasuerus in Handel's Esther with The English Concert (West London Synagogue, London and a Recording) and with Solomon's Knot (Wigmore Hall, Halle Händel-Festspiele and Musikfestspiele Saar); Mozart's Requiem (Wurzburg Mozart Festival); Tenor solo Singalong Messiah (Reisopera); Soldato 1/Valletto/Mercurio/Famiglari 3/Littore/Consoli L'Incoronazione di Poppea with Harry Bicket and The English Concert Orchestra (Auditorio Nacional, Madrid and Palau de la Musica, Barcelona); Verdi’s Requiem (Royal Albert Hall); concerts with Opera Prelude and the Royal Philharmonic Society, an opera gala at the 20th anniversary of the Encuentro de la Música in the Palacio de Festivales, Santander.
Xavier has benefited from the generous support of the King-Farlow Trust and Mr and Mrs McGowan Stuart and is an Opera Prelude Young Artist.
Xavier Hetherington plays Lensky as sincere and passionate. His velvety tenor expresses his great love for Olga in his early aria “How happy, how happy I am!” but it really shines in the duel scene. As Lensky waits at the dawn duelling field, to fight a fight that ironically neither believes in, he has a premonition and sings that he may never see his beloved Olga again. Hetherington sings the well-known Kuda, kuda aria with great intensity, “Where have you gone, golden days of my spring?” It is deeply moving.
The principal characters are mainly young in the story, and are certainly taken by emotions of the moment, be that impulsive passion or the need to duel. Good that this cast was young, therefore, and certainly ardent. That certainly applied to the Lensky of Xavier Hetherington, a tenor whose dynamic range seems. to lie firmly around forte/fortissimo: There is no doubting Hetherington’s vocal power. (Hetherington recently sang the title role in Jonathan Dove’s Itch at Opera Holland Park).
The part of the poet Lensky, Onegin’s sensitive and idealistic best friend and likely the true object of Onegin’s repressed desires, was sung convincingly by the young English tenor Xavier Hetherington. His pure, resonant timbre, particularly in the upper register, culminated in a deeply reflective Act II soliloquy ‘Kuda, Kuda’ (‘How far away my golden days’), an achingly beautiful lament for the transience of love and life, which he delivers just before his death in pre-dawn duel with Onegin.
This time around, Xavier Hetherington takes over the title role...and is an arresting presence as the nerdy teen on a mission to collect every element. His Itch is a mix of boyish curiosity and ethical gravitas beyond his years, and he sings with a clean, unfussy tenor that lifts Dove’s music to its natural pitch. His duets with the returning Natasha Agarwal...anchor the show emotionally. They have the vibe of real siblings—squabbling, supportive, and occasionally brilliant under pressure.
Dove gives Itch (Itchingham Lofte) music of great beauty which Xavier Hetherington sang with clarity and heartfelt poetry, with the character of each element brought out in its distinctive musical signature. I was choking back the tears.
Dove's Itch returns with Xavier Hetherington successfully drawing us into the engaging mix of family , heroes and villains, and mythic drama with real emotional resonance.
Itch might be a teenage boy but his role is most definitely written for an adult singer and Xavier Hetherington [whom we saw last year in Gilbert & Sullivan's Ruddigore at Opera North, and Handel's Esther with Solomon's Knot] brought the right mix of nerdy introspection and tenorial heft to the role. Hetherington has the voice to make the more dramatic passages soar, whilst making us aware of Itch's sheer focus on the elements because, well, people are difficult when you are a teenager. Hetherington successfully drew us along through the plot and carried us away towards the end when the drama turns mythic (Itch descending into the earth to return the new element to its rightful place).
Xavier Hetherington’s irrepressible Dick Dauntless, interspersing Gilbert’s version of Navy slang with the odd hornpipe or two.
It helped that we had a first rate all-singing, all-dancing cast, and for once Xavier Hetherington's Richard felt like a real anti-hero and part of the drama, rather than seeming like an oddity added because Gilbert felt like satirising sailors.
Tenor Xavier Hetherington sings with crystalline clarity and dances a mean Hornpipe as the mariner Richard Dauntless.
The showstopper, though, was Xavier Hetherington, who played Dick Dauntless, whose acting, singing, dancing and acrobatics were full of character and humour, with the swagger associated with a sailor on shore leave making the most of his time on dry land.
There were some excellent voices on stage last night, the vocal honours going to ... and Xavier Hetherington's Richard Dauntless. These are two young singers one can easily envisage as Guglielmo and Ferrando in Mozart's Cosi fan Tutte...
It’s left to Xavier Hetherington as the clichéd mariner Richard Dauntless to come across with equal clarity in both singing and speaking voice.
...But even this is trumped by his devastating final confrontation with Xavier Hetherington’s mesmerisingly sung Quint
Xavier Hetherington’s Quint and Elin Pritchard’s Miss Jessel completed a formidable cast, voices almost too powerful for the acoustic but compelling throughout.
Xavier Hetherington’s Peter Quint will haunt you for weeks.
Xavier Hetherington dominates his scenes as the louche, sinister and manipulative Quint.
This was a well-nigh flawless cast: the crucial role of Peter Quint was chillingly depicted by the expressive, other-worldly tenor of Xavier Hetherington,
The casting was magnificent. Hetherington’s seductive calling of Miles’s name from the tower, with just the celesta as accompaniment, was as chilling and other-worldly as it was alluring.
tenor Xavier Hetherington brings bright, pliable tone to his quartet of pivotal bit-parts.
The superbly polished singers playing dual roles include soprano Anna Dennis, counter tenors James Laing and James Hall, the tenor Xavier Hetherington...
Everyone had their moments in the spotlight. ...a powerful duet (with Xavier Hetherington) from the Welcome Song for King James II, and a profoundly moving prison scene with Hetherington and Brook using O, I'm sick of life leading to the chorus' striking rendition of Hear my prayer, O Lord.
Xavier Hetherington popped up in myriad guises, very much a chameleon, from suave game-show host to mystic Seer, his voice vibrant yet malleable.
wonderfully supported by Xavier Hetherington’s Don Jose
As Don José, Xavier Hetherington enjoys a gentle scene with Micaela, but is at his best at the end of the second act as he tenderly sings to Carmen of his love.
The Don José of Xavier Hetherington was vocally beautiful and sensitive to the nuances of his character; his stage presence was strong.
For me the best moments in the evening were the intimate ones – Carmen convincing Don José to take off her handcuffs and let her escape in Act One; the beautifully controlled singing of the Flower Song in Act Two as well as Carmen’s seductive dancing. I was especially moved by the final scene of Don Jose’s pleading and Carmen’s taunting, the evening’s performance rising to the necessary powerful climax. It was dramatically and vocally powerful.
whilst Xavier Hetherington expresses a controlled ardour as the Shepherd who sings of his happy, simpler love.
The tenor Xavier Hetherington, who spent his summer singing at Glyndebourne, is the besotted Orfeo, who all too briefly beds his bride Eurydice, played by the gorgeous Steffi Fashokun...
Xavier sings so clearly, so tenderly alongside the wonderful mezzo soprano Rose Stachniewska, and guitar playing pure-voiced bass baritone Andrew Slater.