Born in Rutherford, New Jersey, on June 15, 1947, American tenor Howard Crook specialized in Baroque music, which was undergoing a revolution and was rediscovered in the 1980s. A music student at the University of Illinois, he was soon drawn to opera singing, making his Cleveland stage debut in Johann Strauss II's The Bat. However, his interest shifted to the Baroque period and, after his first Purcell recital, Airs & Duets (1977), it was to Europe that he decided to make his career. First in the Netherlands, where he won a singing competition in 's-Hertogenbosch, then in France, where he went on to explore the roles of Baroque opera. His wide-ranging lyric tenor tessitura was noticed by the conductors of the Baroque revival on period instruments. In 1986, he was at the forefront of the revival of Lully's opera Atys conducted by William Christie with Les Arts Florissants, which launched this great movement in France and then worldwide. He took part in the recordings of Bach: Matthäus Passion (1985) and Bach: Johannes Passion (1988) with Philippe Herreweghe, whom he followed for several years; Charpentier: Cinq Leçons de Ténèbres in world premiere with Louis Devos (1986), Handel: Messiah with Trevor Pinnock (1988), Leclair: Scylla et Graucus with John Eliot Gardiner (1988) and other operatic stage productions. With Gardiner, he opened up to the melodies of Berlioz in 1990, then recorded the recital Purcell: Airs and Instrumental Music (1992) with harpsichordist Skip Sempé. Between cantatas and oratorios by Bach and other composers, Howard Crook has carved out a place for himself on the Baroque stage, and in 1994 Marc Minkowski called on his services for Lully's opera Phaëton. The American tenor went on to work with conductors Eric Ericson, Olivier Schneebelli, Hermann Max, Roger Norrington, Sigiswald Kuijken and Stephen Stubbs in Lully's Thésée in 2007. Now professor of Baroque singing at the Conservatoire national de région de Paris, he gives master classes. On August 27, 2024, Howard Crook died at the age of 77.
