Joseph Kaiser, 41, a Canadian tenor who has performed in the great houses of the world, has announced “an indefinite leave of absence” with language that suggests that he is contemplating retirement.
“Due to personal reasons, I will be taking an indefinite leave of absence from my international singing career,” the McGill alumnus and former cantor wrote on Sept. 4 on his Facebook page. “Thank you for your support over the years. I will deeply miss all of my wonderful colleagues and am indebted to all those who believed in me for the past 22 years. I ask that you kindly respect my privacy.”
The Montreal native, who began his career as a baritone, was scheduled to sing six performances in October of Mozart’s La Clemenza di Tito at the Theater an der Wien in Vienna. One of his notable engagements last season was in the Metropolitan Opera production of Thomas Adès’s The Exterminating Angel. The New York Times described Kaiser as “suave” while New York Classical Review called him “the picture of a gracious host, his tenor bright and clean.”
Kaiser made his Metropolitan Opera debut in 2007 as Roméo in Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette. He appeared in Montreal in June as part of the Montreal Chamber Music Festival. And in a Facebook posting on Aug. 28, Kaiser references the early retirement of Indianapolis Colts quarterback Andrew Luck with the word “Amen.”
