The Stage

David Hillman

Published Tuesday 24 November 2009 at 11:06 by Michael Quinn

David Hillman became one of the leading singers of a generation that revitalised British opera in the sixties and seventies, despite his coming to the stage at a late age.

Born in London on November 21, 1934, he left a career in quantity surveying to train at the National Opera School in 1962, making his debut with Welsh National Opera that same year, singing Arvino in I Lombardi. Soon he was singing lead tenor roles in Cardiff and for Opera North and Sadler’s Wells Opera. With a strong stage presence, a compact and clear voice, and a gift for high drama and comedy, he ranged easily and eloquently from Gilbert and Sullivan and Offenbach to Monteverdi, Tchaikovsky and Mozart.

He regularly sang abroad and at home with English National Opera, Glyndebourne and Kent Opera, and premiered several contemporary roles, notably in Richard Rodney Bennett’s The Mines of Sulphur and Thea Musgrave’s Mary, Queen of Scots. He was also involved in the first British productions of Szymanowski’s King Roger and Nielsen’s Saul and David.

Aged 74, he died from a brain tumour on August 8 and is survived by his wife of 45 years.