Hawke’s Bay tenor Taylor Wallbank heads to Italy for opera training

Tenor Taylor Wallbank. Photo / Supplied

By Three to Seven RNZ

Taylor Wallbank likes his opera old school.

This month, the young Hawke’s Bay tenor embarks on a two-year stint in Florence, Italy, for a programme in opera studies and performance at Opera Mascarade.

Wallbank spoke to RNZ Concert ahead of his departure, talking about his opera journey so far and some of his operatic idols. Turns out one of them is the great Carlo Bergonzi.

Opera Mascarade is a training programme for talented young singers, mixing the Florence-based study of the craft with work in opera houses around Italy and Europe.

Wallbank is another of the seemingly endless stream of talented singers to come out of the Hastings suburb of Flaxmere, whose talent was first nourished by Hawke’s Bay music programme Project Prima Volta (PPV).

Others include the Fonoti-Fuimaono brothers: baritones Fa’amanu and Alfred, and tenors Jordan and Emmanuel.

Wallbank says he struggled at school as a teenager, although he found a positive outlet in sport through rugby and boxing.

It was when friends invited him to join a barbershop quartet that the world of singing opened up for him, followed by vocal coaching organised through PPV.

A year ago, Wallbank graduated with a Master of Music in Advanced Opera Studies from The Aotearoa New Zealand Opera School (TANZOS) at the University of Waikato. Now he’s ready to take on Europe.

Italy won’t be a completely novel experience for him, as Wallbank has already spent time there furthering his knowledge of Italian.

Soon he’ll be following in the footsteps of some of his Italian heroes on to the opera stages of Europe.

– RNZ