Omar Ebrahim began singing as a chorister at Coventry Cathedral and went on to study voice at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. He served his performing apprenticeship at the Royal Shakespeare Company and Glyndebourne. He has been associated with many new music projects including The Electrification of the Soviet Union by Nigel Osbourne and Birtwistle’s The Second Mrs Kong for Glyndebourne Festival Opera, and Berio’s Un Re in Ascolto and Birtwistle’s Gawain for the Royal Opera House. He appeared in Liza lim’s opera The Navigator at the festivals in Brisbane and Melbourne and gave first performances of Enno Poppe’s concert and opera collaborations with Marcel Beyer - Interzone, Arbeit Nahrung, Wohnung and IQ - at the Berlin festival, Munich Biennale and Schwetzingen.
In exploring the connection between spoken word and song, he has helped recreate the sound worlds of Frank Zappa (Ensemble Modern, The Adventures of Greggary Peccary) and Blade Runner with the Heritage Orchestra. Other text led projects include Morton Feldman’s Words and Music and Frank O’Hara Songs with the Ensemble Recherche, King Gesar by Peter Lieberson for Munich Biennale. He is also closely associated with Ligeti’s Aventure et nouvelles Aventures. He has performed and recorded In the Penal Colony by Phillip Glass, Michael Nyman’s Facing Goya, Kris de foort’s House of the sleeping Beauties and John Harle’s ballad opera Jamie Allan.
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Schoenberg in Hollywood
Boston Lyric Opera (November 2018)
Ebrahim wholeheartedly gave himself to the lead role, with the character’s stiff, self-conscious affects eroding to reveal a wicked glimmer of humor. The baritone’s robust voice was expressive
Zoë Madonna, Boston Globe
Omar Ebrahim plays an intense Schoenberg who switches his accent to suit the projected film at the time.
Ivy Li, The Tech
The performing forces were small but potent: Baritone Omar Ebrahim was a forceful presence as Schoenberg
Heidi Waleson, Wall Street Journal
The excellent three-person cast was headed by Omar Ebrahim’s superb Schoenberg
Angelo Mao, Opera News Vol. 83, No. 6
Omar Ebrahim made a believable Schoenberg, inhabiting the composer’s emotional and psychological states with conviction
Karl Charna Lynn, Opera Now
Marriage of Figaro (Dr Bartolo)
English Touring Opera (March 2018)
Omar Ebrahim (Bartolo), John-Colyn Gyeantey (Basilio) and Stuart Haycock (Don Curzio) assumed their roles with considerable style
Yehuda Shapiro, Opera Magazine
spirited caricatures from...Omar Ebrahim (Bartolo)...keep the fun bubbling
Richard Morrison, The Times
Secondary roles are nicely sketched in...Omar Ebrahim a redoubtable Bartolo
George Hall, The Stage
Committee... (Alan Yentob)
Donmar Warehouse
Genuine fervour and compunction fight it out with name-dropping pomposity in Omar Ebrahim’s beautifully sung Yentob
Paul Taylor, The Independent
Omar Ebrahim’s Yentob is amusingly tetchy, and his noble baritone makes the character’s bursts of self-importance especially droll
Henry Hitchings, The Evening Standard
Omar Ebrahim is delicious fun in the role, segueing smoothly from patronising defence lawyer mode into full aria
Marianka Swain, theartsdesk.com
Yentob (an exceptional Omar Ebrahim, who suggests a man utterly entranced by himself and the sound of his own glorious baritone, who feels absolutely no contrition whatsoever)
Georgina Brown, Daily Mail
The Suppliant Women
Actors Touring Company (Autumn 2016)
Omar Ebrahim gives a beautifully inflected, heartfelt performance as Danaus, the women’s father and spokesperson.
David Kettle, theartsdesk
the gifted individual performances of Oscar Batterham’s King or the Danaus of Omar Ebrahim
Simon Thompson, What's on Stage
The professional actors, Oscar Batterham, Omar Ebrahim and Gemma May are all extremely well cast. In particular Omar Ebrahim, as the father figure Danaus, has a hugely expressive voice and really exploits the rhythmic nature of the verse.
S.E. Webster, The Reviews Hub Scotland
Penderecki St Luke Passion, London Philharmonic Orchestra
Royal Festival Hall (March 2017)
Omar Ebrahim’s spoken Latin narrative…provided the weight and solemnity which feeds directly into centuries of sacred works, just as Penderecki intended it should.
Cara Chanteau, The Independent
as the speaking narrator, Omar Ebrahim – delivered terrific intensity.
Richard Morrison, The Times
Omar Ebrahim was urgent and impassioned in the spoken role of the Evangelist.
Barry Millington, The Evening Standard
Omar Ebrahim…followed Jurowski’s example in keeping up the dramatic pressure so effectively it had me wondering if this Passion might not be a candidate for being staged.
Peter Reed, Classical Source
The Narrator (A Flowering Tree)
Göteborg Opera (February 2015)
Omar Ebrahim was a figure of great dignity and gave us a lyrical baritone and clear enunciation of the text. His singing was particularly gripping as his voice echoed with the horror of Kumudha's mutilation.
Niklas Smith, Seen and Heard International
Omar Ebrahim’s ability to soar and float on the longer melodic phrases created a real sense of beauty as both music and time appeared to stand still.
Magnus Haglund, GP
Neige
Grand Theatre Luxembourg
Omar Ebrahim, giving a masterclass to the rest of the cast in a characterful and focused portrayal.
Keith Potter, Opera Magazine
Tongue of the Invisible – Liza Lim
Musik Fabrik Recording on WERGO (Oct 2013)
Baritone Omar Ebrahim needs to be heard to be believed—his is an astounding performance, demonstrating that love poetry can pack one hell of a punch.
5against4.com
Julius Fucik, London Philharmonic Orchestra
Royal Festival Hall
Omar Ebrahim’s Fucik, hounded by a handheld searchlight… Chilling and effective.
Richard Morrison, The Times
Omar Ebrahim offered an excellent performance. This excellent account, antiphonal drumming and all, exuded brutality, psychoticism, and yet inviting, spellbinding beauty.
Mark Berry, Boulezian Blog
In the Penal Colony
Music Theatre Wales
That ever-remarkable baritone Omar Ebrahim, always sensitive to text, had chilling authority as the Officer.
Fiona Maddocks, Observer
Omar Ebrahim's powerful and emotive Officer
Kenneth Walton, The Scotsman
Omar Ebrahim put flesh and blood on the blinkered Officer
Andrew Clark, Financial Times
Omar Ebrahim excels as the Officer
George Hall, The Stage
Omar Ebrahim, who sings The Officer, is extremely experienced in contemporary music theatre. His vocal range is prodigious, though not used here where the monotony of the music is part of the plot. Nonetheless, Ebrahim brings surprising lyricism to the part. Some passages shimmer with the fervour of Bach
Anne Ozorio, Opera Today
The heft and robustness of Omar Ebrahim’s baritone gives his performance of the Office an oddly noble solemnity that feeds directly into the work’s profoundly ironic character
Christopher Ballantine, Opera Magazine
Omar Ebrahim’s Repertoire
| Barber | Samuel Hand of Bridge |
|---|---|
| Berio | Un Re in Ascolto (Singer) |
| Beckett | Words and Music |
| Birtwistle | Gawain (Fool) |
| Bizet | Carmen (Escamillo) |
| Cavalli | Calisto |
| Davis | Peace |
| Dove / Feldman | Siren Song |
| Henze | The Raft of the Medusa |
| Lieberson | King Gesar (Narrator) |
| Ligeti | Aventures, Nouvelles Aventures |
| Mozart | Don Giovanni (Don Giovanni) Le Nozze di Figaro (Bartolo) |
| Oliver | Beauty and the Beast (Beast) |
| Osborne | Nigel Hell's Angels |
| Puccini | La Boheme (Schaunard) |
| Schoenberg | A Survivor from Warsaw |
| Sondheim | Sweeney Todd (Tobias) |
| J. Strauss | Die Fledermaus (Orlofsky) |
| R. Strauss | Enoch Arden |
| Sullivan | Iolanthe (Strephon) |
| Tippett | King Priam (Hector) |
| Verdi | Macbeth (Macbeth) |
| Von Bose | 63 Dream Palace (Parkurst) |
| Weill | Mahagonny Songspiel |
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