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The Japanese tenor, Toshi Ogita (Toshimichi Ogita), read MA History of Art & History of Music at the University of Edinburgh (2012-2016). During this time, he studied privately with Scott Johnson, and was a choral scholar at Paisley Abbey (2013-2016). Subsequently, he sang for three years at Truro Cathedral (2016-2019), where he was involved in concerts and recordings with the City of London Sinfonia, BBC NOW, and the BBC Concert Orchestra. He has also sung with RCS Voices, BBC Proms Youth Choir, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and RSNO Choruses. With these choirs, he has participated in numerous BBC Radio 3 broadcasts and televised concerts. Prior to starting at RAM, he sang regularly at Winchester Cathedral (Winchester Cathedral Choir), where he continues to sing.
Since 2020, Toshi Ogita is a Master's student at the Royal Academy of Music, under the tutelage of Richard Berkeley-Steele and Anna Tilbrook. He is generously supported by the RAM Bursary Award and a number of private supporters. He is involved in numerous projects at the Academy, including ‘Bach the European’ series.
Toshi Ogita has performed the role of Malcolm in Verdi’s Macbeth for Duchy Opera, and Tamino in a semi-staged performance of excerpts from W.A. Mozart's Die Zauberflöte at Truro Cathedral. He performed in the chorus for W.A. Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro (2019) at the New Generation Festival in Florence. In opera scenes at the Oxenfoord International Summer School, he performed the roles of Mayor in Benjamin Britten's Albert Herring and Basilio/Don Curzio W.A. Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro. On the concert platform, performances include W.A. Mozart's Requiem with Truro Choral Society, and as a ripienist in George Frideric Handel's Esther with Opera dei Lumi. Recently, he was in a live-streamed concert from Duke's Hall, RAM, with Iain Ledingham, of J.S. Bach's Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland, BWV 62, and G.F. Handel's Dixit Dominus. In 2017, he performed in the world-premiere of the cantata Jeremiad for alto, tenor, and piano by Alex Woolf, a work written specifically for Toshi. Intended as a companion piece to B. Britten's Canticle II, Abraham and Isaac, Jeremiad was performed alongside both B. Britten's Canticles I and II at Truro Cathedral.
A keen recitalist, Toshi Ogita is particularly passionate about lieder. With pianist Tim Dean, he has performed Schubert’s Schwanengesang, and a selection from Robert Schumann's Myrthen. Together with pianist Alexandra Standing, they gave a live-streamed recital in March 2021 for Stockbridge Music, titled 'Desire in Spring', of songs by R. Schumann's, Schubert, Duparc, Gurney, and others. Cycles currently in preparation also include Tippet's The Heart's Assurance and Lili Boulanger's Clairières dans le ciel.
Upcoming engagements include performances around the UK of Hugo Wolf’s Italienisches Liederbuch with soprano Helen Lacey and pianist Max Bilbe, and a complete survey of R. Schumann's Myrthen. In 2021, Toshi Ogita will be performing Nemerino in L’elisir d’amore in opera scenes at RAM. In March 2021, he took part in SWAP'ra's 'Forgotten Voices', an online festival to celebrate International Women's Day, which streamed hitherto unrecorded songs and arias by female composers. In July 2021, he will be performing the role of Enchanted Plant/3rd Water Deity in Brighton Early Music Festival’s production of Francesca Caccini’s La liberazione di Ruggiero dall’isola d’Alcina. In winter 2021, Toshi and Alex Standing will be giving performances of Schubert's Winterreise.
Having been introduced by Scott Johnson to the writings of Richard Miller, Kenneth Bozeman, and David L. Jones, Toshi Ogita has a keen interest in vocal pedagogy. In particular, he is interested in how the tripartite system of respiration, phonation, and resonation is a non-linear synergistic one, influencing and interacting with each other; semantic differences and their implications; the relationship between sensory perception/kinesthesia vs. what is physiologically happening; pedagogic efficiency and how certain aims are prioritised over the course of teaching an individual.\
Originally a double-bass player and a music scholar at Ampleforth College, Toshi Ogita was a Hesse student at the 2014 Aldeburgh Festival. Having received tuition in conducting from William Conway, he has also conducted choral societies and student orchestras. His undergraduate dissertation (2016), titled ‘Lost to the World: the visual and musical cultures of fin-de -siècle Vienna’ explored the interaction between art and music in early 20th-century Vienna, through Schopenhauer and Wagner, specifically between Gustav Mahler and Klimt. The work has been praised for its originality by Christian Weikop, Peter Vergo, and Richard Stokes. Toshi is interested in music’s role as a socio-cultural indicator, historical examples of interdisciplinary collaboration, and exploring this through programming.
Toshi Ogita lives in Stockbridge, Hampshire with his partner and a retired greyhound. In his spare time, he is a part-time cabinet-maker, and a sourdough baker. |
