- Hadley, Jerry
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▪ 2008American opera singerborn June 16, 1952, Princeton, Ill.died July 18, 2007, Poughkeepsie, N.Y.was acclaimed in the U.S. and Europe for his bold stage presence and superb acting ability as well as for his versatile lyric tenor voice that lent itself to both operatic and musical theatre interpretations. He gained renown for recordings of Jerome Kern's Show Boat (1988), Leonard Bernstein's Candide (1989), and Paul McCartney's Liverpool Oratorio (1991). He was considered the leading tenor in the U.S. during the mid-1980s and early '90s, and his recordings earned him three Grammy Awards. Hadley made his professional debut in a Lake George Opera production of Mozart's Così fan tutte (1976). He was under contract (1979–89) with the New York City Opera and was a regular performer at New York's Metropolitan Opera, where his most memorable roles included Tom Rakewell in Igor Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress (1997) and the title role in John Harbison's The Great Gatsby (1999). Hadley also enjoyed a long run (1986–2005) at the Chicago Lyric Opera, where he sang 11 leading roles, including Camille de Rosillon in Franz Lehár's The Merry Widow (1986) and Luigi in the world premiere of William Bolcom's A Wedding (2004), directed by Robert Altman. One of Hadley's final performances was in Australia in the role of Pinkerton in Giacomo Puccini's Madama Butterfly (2007). Hadley, who suffered from depression, succumbed to a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
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Universalium. 2010.
