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Brenden Gunnell portrays Erik with a precise and melodic articulation. His initially gentle timbre takes on a darker tone in tense moments, while his expressiveness remains remarkably consistent.

Brenden Gunnell as Hermann and the French soprano Solen Mainguené as Lisagave a very strong, stirring performance.

Brenden Gunnell, vocally sovereign, gives a vivid, rather lyrical portrayal of Hermann, with great scenic finesse. His performance totally convinces up to the pain threshold.

Vocally, these music theatre worlds are in totally different galaxies. The male singers need definitively more power in an uncomfortable range. Yet Brenden Gunnell as Hermann doesn’t at all roar. His tenor voice is steadily warm and round, no matter what range or dynamic. You can hardly find a recording with a vocal interpretation of this role with such a combination of beauty and expression. And as an actor, Gunnells continues where he had finished as a fantastic Peter Grimes. A solitary misfit, whose loneliness and unsaid feelings drag him into perdition. A spectacular, surprisingly lyrical, sensationally intense and personal portrayal.

The most demanding is the tenor part of Johannes, where there was a change due to the illness of the announced performer, but the American tenor Brenden Gunnell distributed his forces in such a way that after a more cautious introduction, he managed the dramatic and more lyrical passages of the dominant role.

No problem here for the soloists, mezzo-soprano Karen Cargill and tenor Brenden Gunnell, who encompassed all the challenges the work entails. (…) Gunnell was apassionately heroic Gerontius in Elgar’s oratorio in 2025, (…) Gunnell’s heldentenor was ideal for the rousing opening blaze of ‘Das Trinklied vom Jammer der Erde’(‘The drinking-song of the Earth’s sorrow’), which has something of Dylan Thomas’s“Rage, rage against the dying of light” in its refusal to abjectly capitulate to death.(…) Gunnell sang its thrice-repeated line ‘Dunkel ist das Leben, ist der Tod,” (‘Darkis life, dark is death’) acknowledging its bleak existential weight and wryly gave’life’s long vanity’ its due. But there was death-defying bravado in the exhortation for his companions (all of us) to ‘raise your cups’ and drain them down’.

Turning to Mahler was quite the gear change, and for a time it seemed as if the players’ relish in tackling its luscious complexity would drown out Brenden Gunnell completely. However, they soon got the measure of each other, leading to a trio of compelling performances from him. Electricity coursed through Das Trinklied vom Jammer der Erde, focused and radiated from Gunnell, while in Von der Jugend they all tapped into something of the same rustic tone heard in the first half, here given a mischievous twist. Its shift into introspection was superb, especially asGunnell suddenly shrugged it off with authentically youthful abandon. He was at his best in his final song, as the drunkard in springtime, leaning into its boorish attitude. Here too, the shift when meeting the bird was beautifully handled, becoming a transfixed reverie, before Gunnell rudely shoved beyond it, producing a flask after his closing line to take a large swig.

As Gerontius himself, we heard the American-British tenor Brenden Patrick Gunnell, and he was immensely impressive. Singing largely from memory and able to switch from floaty head voice to full-throated heroic tenor, Mr Gunnell was something of a revelation.

In the central tenor role of Gerontius, Brenden Patrick Gunnell struck an effective balance between anguished vulnerability and radiant intimacy.

Much of that was down to a well-matched solo team. As Gerontius – the sinningsoul whosefinal journey takes him before his God before finding eventual peace through redemption – tenor Brenden Patrick Gunnell was a towering protagonist. His eye contact with the audience – he sang predominantly off the book – was as compelling as the calculated vocal engineering and nuanced phrasing that together ensured such a commanding portrayal.

New to the cast is tenor Brenden Gunnell, who is so strongly cast that he is chiefly the one who remains in the memory, causing the production of Wake-Walker to somewhat fade. After seeing Gunnell as the title character, it’s hard to imagine another tenor as Grimes. It’s as if Gunnell has captured a monopoly in our mind. Gunnell is vocally very fine, but he prioritises the theater… The frustration that his character has to deal with from the beginning of the opera, which often expresses itself in aggression, is supremely believable and lived out by Gunnell. […] The unpolished character of the brutish fisherman and the almost insane desperation at the end: it’s all there. The interpreter has to mix the lyricism that could invite sympathy with the dangerous side of Grimes, and Gunnell does a great job of this. He is extremely flexible vocally, occasionally even less strictly attentive, but rather not cautious but direct and then again lyrical. […] Very beautiful too, the opening scene of the third act (interlude Moonlight), which is without singing, and where we see Gunnell from his back perspective for several minutes in this staging, and the emotional charge still reaches us.

First and foremost in the title role is the American Brenden Gunnell, a grumpy, gnarly, red-haired tenor who comes across as a picture-book Brit and fisherman. Not only in his acting, but also in his singing, he spans a wide arc from the lyrical to the heroic.

Brenden Gunnell is a first-class Grimes

A performance of Peter Grimes naturally rises and falls with the performer of the title character. Leipzig is fortunate to have a member of the ensemble who is the perfect cast: the American tenor Brenden Gunnell. On the one hand, his Grimes is in some passages a deeply feeling poet with ravishingly tender tones: “Now the Great Bear and Pleiades”. On the other hand, however, he is not only impetuous and rough in his demeanor, but also in his voice. Just think of the harsh words with which he rejects Ellen: “Take away your hand!” Gunnell’s final monologue, when Grimes realizes that there is no place for him in society, is somewhere between turmoil and resignation – it is shattering and has stayed with me long after the opera was over.”

The part of Peter Grimes requires a singer, who should be able to withstand extreme strains. With impressive physical presence, Brenden Gunnell succeeded in drawing the psycho dramatical portrayal of Peter Grimes in his tragic brokenness as a lone wolf and protector in search of love. He met the challenges in the role with heldentenor power and revealed a full sound, which gave an eruptive power to the misery of the marginalised figure. He disposed of both lyrical intimacy and subtle color, that emerged from the words.

Brenden Gunnell’s interpretation of the title role is tremendously impressive. He sings and plays a broken, hounded character. In his stocky stature, he is a head smaller than his apprentice John. Vocally, he also performs the part with suppressed power. He doesn’t sing brilliantly or „beautifully“ but with great intensity.

…With him, his scenic presence as well as with his wonderfully bright, powerful, clear and phonetically flawless tenor, the musical threads of this impressive production come together.

One hopes that [Opolais] can ultimately realize her strong instincts one day. And when she does, I hope she’ll bring Brenden Gunnell, who brought a virile tone to Sergei’s taxing music.

Brenden Gunnell moulded a delightfully comic portray of Sergei, the callow, self-centered, skirt-chasing servant who leads the tragic heroine astray. His hefty heldentenor was most effective in his early scenes with Katerina and in his later duets with Maria Barakova as Sonyetka.

Brenden Gunnell is growing into a notable Heldentenor as a member of the Leipzig company. He sings rather than recites the longer passages about his past, renders ‘Winterstürme wichen den Wonnemond’ very movingly, and his ‘Wälse!’ compares very well to that of his peers.

Supreme in that respect was Brendan Gunnell’s Loge. As good a devious demi-god as I’ve seen anywhere, a heroic edge to the tenor voice bringing beauty to passages like the one in which he sings of women’s beauty on earth as a thing not to be traded for gold. Fire implicit in the red string vest and glasses, leather setting him apart, a brilliant thinker.