Dr. Troy Castle has been recognized for his “robust” bass-baritone voice (The Greenville News), the regional and national success of his voice students, and the quality of his original research. He has covered and performed leading stage roles, including Mr. Laurence in Little Women: The Broadway Musical, Capulet in Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette, Melchior in Menotti’s Amahl and the Night Visitors, the title role in Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi, and Bartolo in Rossini’s Il Barbiere di Siviglia. His major concert credits include featured solo performances in Zelenka’s Litaniae Omnium Sanctorum, Brahms’s Requiem, Handel’s Messiah, Mendelssohn’s Elijah and St. Paul, Mozart’s Requiem, and Handel’s Chandos Anthem No. 9. He has collaborated with regional and university ensembles for concert performances that include excerpts from many selections in the operatic, musical theatre and song canons. His performance output also includes numerous collaborative and solo recitals encompassing a broad range of literature, and in 2011 he participated in a Lieder seminar and concert under the direction of world-renowned performer and pedagogue John O’Conor.
In 2023, Dr. Castle was the national second-place winner in the American Prize in Vocal Performance Friedrich and Virginia Schorr Memorial Award (men’s division). He was a finalist in the “Men in Opera” category of the 2020 American Prize award and was a 2019 finalist for the “Men in Oratorio/Art Song” category and the Chicago Oratorio Award of the same. In 2017, he was a finalist in the artist division of the National Opera Association’s Carolyn Bailey and Dominick Argento vocal competition. He was twice a regional runner-up in the highly competitive National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS) Artist Award competition (2010 & 2012). During his graduate and postgraduate studies, he was the Shenandoah Conservatory soloist competition winner and received the Grace Levinson and Richard Veale awards for his performances.
Named an “Emerging Leader” by NATS in 2020, Dr. Castle was also the co-recipient of the 2015 Shenandoah Conservatory “Dean’s Graduate Scholar Award” which recognizes exceptional aptitude for research and scholarship, and his research on the elite operatic baritone voice has been presented at the annual symposium of The Voice Foundation and at national and regional NATS conferences. He is a Level III trained instructor in Somatic Voicework™—The LoVetri Method and has completed post-certification training in pop/rock singing styles. In addition to the Doctor of Musical Arts degree in voice pedagogy from Shenandoah Conservatory, he also holds a master’s degree in voice performance and an undergraduate degree in church music.
Dr. Castle is an active member of NATS and the Pan American Vocology Association (PAVA), and his engagement with current trends in voice research and the emerging field of vocology informs his instruction. He was actively involved in PAVA’s recent effort to establish a “Recognized Vocologist” credential while earning the distinction of becoming one of the first Recognized Vocologists in the PAVA-RV cohort. He is also a past Vice President of the Central Illinois NATS chapter. His students have enjoyed success in their performance endeavors, winning and placing in regional and national competitions, being accepted into competitive graduate programs and performing in a variety of regional, national and international venues.
A frequent adjudicator of voice competitions, Dr. Castle has also presented numerous masterclasses, workshops and lectures, with a particular focus on the resonance strategies of the operatic baritone voice. He has served as the Coordinator of Vocal Studies at Millikin University since 2020 and continues to perform regularly in addition to his teaching and research pursuits.