John David Darrenkamp (born July 1935) is an American baritone and voice teacher. He was a leading baritone at the New York City Opera from 1969 to 1977, starring in several operas opposite Beverly Sills. He sang regularly at the Metropolitan Opera ("the Met") in mainly comprimario roles from 1979 to 1992, returning later to the Met stage for one last opera in 1995 after a gap of some years. He appeared in more than 500 performances at the Met in 27 different roles. In his late career he worked as a standby at the Met until his retirement from professional performance in 1999. He joined the faculty of Pennsylvania Academy of Music in 1991 where he taught until the school's closure in 2011. As of 2023 he was teaching singing at Lancaster's Popovsky Performing Arts Studio.
A native of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, Darrenkamp served in the United States Marine Corps during the Korean War and worked at U.S. military facilities before becoming an opera singer. He developed an interest in opera through performances in productions with the Lancaster Opera Workshop (later OperaLancaster) from 1959 to 1965. In 1964 he won a scholarship to the Academy of Vocal Arts in Philadelphia where he studied until his graduation in 1969. While a student there he made his professional opera debut with the Philadelphia Lyric Opera Company in 1966. In his early career he performed in many operas in Philadelphia, and later starred as Valentin in Charles Gounod's Faust in the first production staged by the newly created Opera Company of Philadelphia (now Opera Philadelphia) in 1975.
On the international stage, Darrenkamp starred in one opera at the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City and two operas with Montserrat Caballé at the Liceu in Barcelona in 1969. He worked as a leading baritone with regional opera companies throughout the United States from the late 1960s into the early 1980s, sometimes working with major stars like Luciano Pavarotti, Franco Corelli, Renata Tebaldi, and Joan Sutherland. Some of the roles he sang repeatedly included Count Almaviva in Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro, Escamillo in Georges Bizet's Carmen, Lescaut in Massenet's Manon, Marcello in Giacomo Puccini's La bohème, Sharpless in Puccini's Madame Butterfly, and Gounod's Valentin. He was also active as a concert singer with American orchestras, and sang the title role in Felix Mendelssohn's Elijah many time during his career. In retirement he has remained active in mainly non-professional community concerts in Lancaster and the surrounding region. In the 2010s he worked as the artistic director of OperaLancaster, and has both directed and performed in events with that organization. In 2024 he sang in concert with the Penn Square Opera at the age of 88.
Early life and marriage The son of John Elwood Darrenkamp and Pearl Mae Darrenkamp (nee Huss), John David Darrenkamp was born in Lancaster, Pennsylvania in July 1935.John David Darrenkamp in the U.S., Index to Public Records, 1994-2019 His father worked as a machinist at the Permutit Company, and was a resident of Lancaster for his entire life. His mother was also a Lancaster native. He had one brother, Robert William Darrenkamp, who had a lengthy career as a respiratory therapist at the Brookwood Medical Center in Birmingham, Alabama.
As a child, Darrenkamp's singing ability was first identified by his sixth-grade teacher at Lafayette School, Miss Jean Pyott, who convinced him to join the school chorus. He became active as a boy soprano at St. James Episcopal Church in Lancaster where he received voice training with Frank McConnell. He attended John Reynolds Junior High School where he was a member of the boy's glee club directed by Edna I. Brown. After his voice changed, he sang as a baritone in the choir at First Church of God in Lancaster where he became a member in 1950.
Darrenkamp attended J. P. McCaskey High School, but dropped out when he was 17 to join the military. In 1952 he enlisted in the United States Marine Corps, beginning his service in July of that year. He was stationed at Camp Lejeune in Jacksonville, North Carolina, in 1953. In 1954 he was deployed to Turkey as a member of the 1st Battalion, 6th Marines in the United States Sixth Fleet. He completed his high school education in the military, and was a veteran of the Korean War.
After finishing his service in the marines, Darrenkamp worked as a production clerk at the Marietta Air Force Station in Marietta, Pennsylvania, into the early 1960s. He also spent some time working at the Olmsted Air Force Base. He concurrently worked as a staff church and synagogue singer at both First Methodist Church and Congregation Shaarai Shomayim in Lancaster. In 1956 he married Jocelyn May Flowers, and the couple settled at a home in Lancaster on W. Vine St. Early in the marriage they had three daughters: Dawn, Julia, and Elaine. Elaine was born with serious developmental disability, and she was institutionalized at Allentown State Hospital.
Early years with Lancaster Opera Workshop Darrenkamp began studying voice with Frederick Robinson briefly as a teenager but abandoned these studies upon joining the marines. He resumed studies with Robinson in 1956. Robinson was a former opera singer and the founder and director of the Lancaster Opera Workshop (LOW), a quasi-professional community theatre organization that used non-paid amateur and professional singers and a paid professional orchestra. In December 1959 Darrenkamp made his opera debut with LOW as the Page in Gian Carlo Menotti's Amahl and the Night Visitors in a production directed by Robinson. In January 1960 he became an official member of the LOW when he was 24 years old.
In May 1960 Darrenkamp performed the role of Prince Yamadori in LOW's production of Giacomo Puccini's Madama Butterfly at the Fulton Opera House (FOH) with Dorothy Rose Smith in the title role. He continued to perform regularly in LOW productions and concerts in the Lancaster region in his formative years. Some of the parts he performed with LOW included Count Gil in The Secret of Susanna (1961), Toby in The Medium (1961), the Sailor in Gabriele Pierne's La croisade des infant's (1961, sung in English as The Children's Crusade), Marcello in La bohème (1962), Escamillo in Carmen (1963), the title role in Gianni Schicchi (1964 & 1965), and Valentine in Faust (1965).
Darrenkamp was also involved with other musical groups in the Lancaster area in the 1960s, including appearing as a guest soloist with choirs at Elizabethtown College and the Lancaster Civic Chorus. From 1963 to 1966 he portrayed the American Revolutionary soldier Captain Matthew Hale in the annually staged pageant Vorspiel at the Ephrata Cloister which was directed by Robinson but not a part of LOW. It featured music by the religious leader Conrad Beissel who founded the Ephrata Community. He also worked as an oratorio soloist with local church groups.
Academy of Vocal Arts and early professional work Approaching the age of 30, Darrenkamp won a scholarship to the Academy of Vocal Arts (AVA) in Philadelphia in 1964. He was also given a scholarship of $1,000.00 by LOW to support additional expenses while he attended the school. At that time he had three young children, and had not yet learned to read music or play piano having previously picked up his repertoire by listening to recordings or hearing material in rehearsals. He studied voice at AVA for three years with Dorothy DiScala. He was also trained in many other skills there from music literacy and basic piano skills to stage movement and acting and foreign languages. He also sang in many student opera productions at the school. He graduated from AVA in 1969.
While a student at AVA, Darrenkamp gave his first performance with a professional company portraying Zuàne in the Philadelphia Lyric Opera Company's (PLO) October 1966 production of Arrigo Boito's La Gioconda. It was performed at the Academy of Music (AM) under conductor Anton Guadagno. Renata Tebaldi portayed the title role with Franco Corelli as Enzo and Mignon Dunn as Laura. That same month he appeared at the AM as the baritone soloist in Orff's Carmina Burana in a co-production with the Pennsylvania Ballet and the Philadelphia Oratorio Society (POS). He had previously performed with the POS as the baritone soloist in A German Requiem by Brahms in 1966 which was recorded for radio broadcast.
Some of the other roles he performed with the PLO at the AM included Le Dancaïre in Carmen (1967, with Grace Bumbry), Pâris in Roméo et Juliette (1967), and Valentine in Gounod's Faust (1967). He sang the role of Schaunard in La bohème at PLO in 1968 with Judith Raskin as Mimì and Giacomo Aragall as Rodolfo, and then returned to the PLO in the same opera as Marcello in 1969 with a cast led by Tebaldi and Corelli. In 1972 he performed with the PLO at the Robin Hood Dell in the title role of The Barber of Seville before a crowd of 9,000 people. In 1974 he sang Sharpless to Renata Scotto's Cio-Cio-San in PLO's production of Madama Butterfly.
Darrenkamp was also active in operas conducted by Carl Suppa for Philadelphia's Little Lyric Opera Company which were given at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, including portraying Dr Malatesta in Don Pasquale (1967) and Germont in La traviata (1968). He also performed in operas presented in concert versions at the Penn Museum with the Concerto Soloists and conductor Marc Mastovoy, performing the roles of Polyphemus in George Frideric Handel's Acis and Galatea (1967) and Nanni in Joseph Haydn's rarely performed L'infedeltà delusa (1968).
In 1969 Darrenkamp made his European debut at the Liceu in Barcelona, Spain as Lescaut in Jules Massenet's Manon, and was also head there that same year as Giorgio Talbot in Donizetti's Maria Stuarda. Both productions starred Montserrat Caballé. That same year he performed Marcello at the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City, and was a guest soloist with the men's chorus of the Orpheus Club of Philadelphia.
New York career New York City Opera Darrenkamp moved to New York City in 1969, and continued his voice studies there with Jerry Forderhase. While he had a New York City apartment, he maintained his family residence in Lancaster. He made his debut with the New York City Opera (NYCO) that year as Sharpless in Madama Butterfly with Barbara Rondelli as Cio-Cio-San. He sang Sharpless again at the NYCO in 1970 with Maralin Niska as Cio-Cio San. In October 1969 he sang the title role in the NYCO's production of Borodin's Prince Igor. In 1970 he performed the role of Lescaut in Jules Massenet's Manon with Beverly Sills in the title role, a role he repeated in 1973 with Patricia Brooks assuming the part of Manon.
Some of the other operas Darrenkamp performed in with NYCO included Gounod's Faust (1970, as Valentin), Menotti's Help, Help, the Globolinks! (1970, as Dr. Stone with Ellen Faull as Madame Euterpova), Mozart's Così fan tutte (1971, as Guglielmo), Mozart's Don Giovanni (1972, as Masetto to Veronica Tyler's Zerlina) Donizetti's Maria Stuarda (1972, as Talbot to Maria of Beverly Sills), Puccini's La bohème (1972, as Marcello to Rodolfo of Enrico Di Giuseppe and Mimì of Gilda Cruz-Romo), and Mascagni's Cavalleria rusticana (1973, as Alfio to Canio of Herman Malamood). He repeated the role of Alfio at the NYCO in 1976 with Ermanno Mauro as Canio.