Richard Stilwell III is an opera

Opera

Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...

tic and concert baritone

Baritone

Baritone is a type of male singing voice that lies between the bass and tenor voices. It is the most common male voice. Originally from the Greek , meaning deep sounding, music for this voice is typically written in the range from the second F below middle C to the F above middle C Baritone (or...

.

After graduating from Indiana University

Indiana University

Indiana University is a multi-campus public university system in the state of Indiana, United States. Indiana University has a combined student body of more than 100,000 students, including approximately 42,000 students enrolled at the Indiana University Bloomington campus and approximately 37,000...

 in 1966, Stilwell joined the Army Chorus in Washington. He appeared as a soloist with the chorus singing the tribute: "One Small Step" in a national telecast with the returning astronaut

Astronaut

An astronaut or cosmonaut is a person trained by a human spaceflight program to command, pilot, or serve as a crew member of a spacecraft....

s of Apollo 11

Apollo 11

In early 1969, Bill Anders accepted a job with the National Space Council effective in August 1969 and announced his retirement as an astronaut. At that point Ken Mattingly was moved from the support crew into parallel training with Anders as backup Command Module Pilot in case Apollo 11 was...

 and President Richard Nixon

Richard Nixon

Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...

. He also appeared with the American Light Opera Company

American Light Opera Company

The American Light Opera Company was a semi-professional theatre company performing light operas and musicals in Washington, D.C. from 1960 to 1968...

.

He currently lives in McLean, Virginia with his wife and two sons.

Stilwell sang Billy Budd in the premiere of Britten's Billy Budd

Billy Budd (opera)

Billy Budd is an opera by Benjamin Britten, from a libretto by E. M. Forster and Eric Crozier, was first performed at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London on 1 December 1951. It is based on the short novel Billy Budd by Herman Melville....

at the Metropolitan Opera

Metropolitan Opera

The Metropolitan Opera is an opera company, located in New York City. Originally founded in 1880, the company gave its first performance on October 22, 1883. The company is operated by the non-profit Metropolitan Opera Association, with Peter Gelb as general manager...

, directed by John Dexter

John Dexter

John Dexter was an English theatre, opera, and film director.- Theatre :Born in Derby, England, Dexter left school at the age of fourteen to serve in the British army during World War II. Following the war, he began working as a stage actor before turning to producing and directing shows for...

. He appears alongside Frederica von Stade

Frederica von Stade

Frederica von Stade is an American mezzo-soprano. Born in Somerville, New Jersey, she acquired the nickname "Flicka" in her childhood. Von Stade attended the Mannes College of Music in New York City. She made her debut with the Metropolitan Opera in 1970 and in 1971 appeared as Cherubino in The...

 in the landmark recording of Pelléas et Mélisande

Pelléas et Mélisande (opera)

Pelléas et Mélisande is an opera in five acts with music by Claude Debussy. The French libretto was adapted from Maurice Maeterlinck's Symbolist play Pelléas et Mélisande...

under the baton of Herbert von Karajan

Herbert von Karajan

Herbert von Karajan was an Austrian orchestra and opera conductor. To the wider world he was perhaps most famously associated with the Berlin Philharmonic, of which he was principal conductor for 35 years...

, and as the voice of Count Almaviva (from Le nozze di Figaro) and Don Giovanni in the 1984 film, Amadeus

Amadeus (film)

Amadeus is a 1984 period drama film directed by Miloš Forman and written by Peter Shaffer. Adapted from Shaffer's stage play Amadeus, the story is based loosely on the lives of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Antonio Salieri, two composers who lived in Vienna, Austria, during the latter half of the...

.

On DVD, Stilwell can be seen in Götz Friedrich

Götz Friedrich

Götz Friedrich was a German opera and theatre director.He was a student and assistant of Walter Felsenstein at the Komische Oper Berlin in Berlin, where he went on to direct his early productions...

's film of Falstaff (with Karan Armstrong

Karan Armstrong

Karan Armstrong is an American operatic soprano who has had an active international career since the 1960s.-Biography:...

 and Gabriel Bacquier

Gabriel Bacquier

Gabriel Bacquier is a French operatic baritone. One of the leading baritones of the 20th century and particularly associated with the French and Italian repertories, he is considered a fine singing-actor equally at home in dramatic or comic roles.-Life and career:Gabriel Bacquier was born in...

, conducted by Sir Georg Solti

Georg Solti

Sir Georg Solti, KBE, was a Hungarian-British orchestral and operatic conductor. He was a major classical recording artist, holding the record for having received the most Grammy Awards, having personally won 31 as a conductor, including the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. In addition to his...

, 1979), La bohème from the Met (with Teresa Stratas

Teresa Stratas

Teresa Stratas, OC , is a retired Canadian operatic soprano. She is especially well-known for her award-winning recording of Alban Berg's Lulu.-Early life and career:...

, Renata Scotto

Renata Scotto

Renata Scotto is an Italian soprano and opera director.Recognized for her sense of style, musicality and as a remarkable singer-actress, Scotto is considered one of the preeminent singers of her generation, specializing in the bel canto repertoire with excursions into the verismo and Verdi...

, and José Carreras

José Carreras

Josep Maria Carreras i Coll , better known as José Carreras , is a Spanish Catalan tenor particularly known for his performances in the operas of Verdi and Puccini...

, in Franco Zeffirelli

Franco Zeffirelli

Franco Zeffirelli KBE is an Italian director and producer of films and television. He is also a director and designer of operas and a former senator for the Italian center-right Forza Italia party....

's production, 1982), and Robert Wilson

Robert Wilson (director)

Robert Wilson is an American avant-garde stage director and playwright who has been called "[America]'s — or even the world's — foremost vanguard 'theater artist'". Over the course of his wide-ranging career, he has also worked as a choreographer, performer, painter, sculptor, video...

's production of Madama Butterfly (2003).

Although continuing to appear at major opera houses throughout the United States and Europe, Stilwell instructs voice at the Chicago College of Performing Arts

Chicago College of Performing Arts

Chicago College of Performing Arts is a performing arts college that is housed at Roosevelt University in Chicago, Illinois. The college has two divisions: the Music Conservatory and the Theatre Conservatory.- History :...

 in Chicago, Illinois.

Sources

• Myers, Eric, Reunion: Richard Stilwell,Opera News, June 2006, vol 70, no. 12
• Biography on Columbia Artists Management