He was born in Minneapolis on 29/2/1920. He studied at Minnesota’s College of Music, the Curtis Institute and the Berkshire Music Center. In 1948, urged by conductor Serge Koussevitzky, he sang in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9. In 1949 he was selected by Benjamin Britten to sing the lead role in the US premiere of the opera Albert Herring. In 1950 he made his New York Opera debut as David in The Master-Singers of Nuremberg [Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg] and thereafter performed here regularly throughout the 1950s. He has sung in productions of the NBC Opera Theater, including the US premiere of Prokofiev’s War and Peace (1957). In 1957 he appeared at the Glyndebourne Festival, where he sang Tamino (The magic flute/Die Zauberflöte) and Bacchus (Ariadne on Naxos /Ariadne auf Naxos). In addition, he was distinguished as an oratory singer. He began teaching since the 1960s; he taught at the Universities of Iowa, West Virginia and Illinois, Hunter College, Julliard School, etc. He served as director of the Lake George Opera Festival (1965-1980), the William Matheus Sullivan Musical Foundation and the American Opera Center at Julliard (1985-1988). He participated in recordings under the baton of Serge Koussevitzky, Leonard Bernstein, Bruno Walter, Eugene Ormandy, Fritz Reiner, Dimitri Mitropoulos and others. He worked with the GNO once, singing the role of Idamante [Idomeneo, King of Crete/Idomeneo, re di Creta], staged at the Odeon of Herodes Atticus as part of the Athens Festival. He died in New York on 8/2/2013.