Evangelist: St John Passion / Britten Sinfonia 2023
“…the highest accolades go to Gwilym Bowen as the Evangelist and Michael Mofidian as Jesus. Their centrality to the evening placed a significant burden of responsibility on each, and both rose to the challenge superbly. Bowen revealed a tenor that was highly precise and possessed of a lightness of touch that aided the flexibility he revealed in phrasing his lines.”
Music OMH
“This foregrounding of the narrative, and its compelling urgency, was in no small part the result of an astonishingly discerning performance by tenor Gwilym Bowen as the Evangelist. It wasn’t so much a performance which grabbed one’s attention from the first, rather one which accrued persuasive integrity as it unfolded, so that I found myself feeling as if Bowen was recounting his story directly to me, and me alone, even as I sat far away, in the Barbican stalls, amid a crowd of attentive listeners.”
Opera Today
“Gwilym Bowen was winningly fervent as the Evangelist…”
The Telegraph
Evangelist: St Matthew Passion / Music of the Baroque 2023
“Gwilym Bowen has a wide musical range and an exceptionally fine singing voice, plus his delivery pulls the entire production together.”
Around The Town Chicago
“Gwilym Bowen’s high, flexible tenor proved ideal for the Evangelist.”
Chicago Classical Review
“…a particular star turn by British tenor Gwilym Bowen. In the narrator role of The Evangelist, Bowen appeared in virtually every scene singing passages from the Gospel in a crystalline voice…”
Third Coast Review
J. S. Bach: St John Passion / Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra 2019
“The Evangelist, the backbone of the work who carries the narrative through to the end was sung by Gwilym Bowen with clarity and accuracy of tone and dramatic commitment.”
Bachtrack
Handel: Brockes Passion / Academy of Ancient Music 2019
“Tenor Gwilym Bowen was a superb Peter, capturing the diverse and contradictory emotions experienced by the troubled disciple in an extended sequence in the first part of the Passion. Anger at Judas’ betrayal of Jesus blazed through the running lines of “Poison and fire, lightning and flood”, accompanied by agile unison strings; his avowal that he would not forsake Christ, “Take me with you, cowardly crowd” was sincere and soft, the fine, unwavering line complemented by Sarah McMahon’s eloquent cello obbligato … his responses are insistent yet instilled with a beautiful pathos and sincerity, particularly as he falls in register. Bowen’s tenor burns with self-loathing, the text fiercely declaimed, the rapid divisions clear”
Opera Today
“Peter’s agony is particularly well caught by the tenor Gwilym Bowen … (he is) something of a rising glory”
The Times
Handel: Brockes Passion / AAM Records 2019
“Gwilym Bowen an intensely dramatic Peter, whether in his splenetic outburst at Judas’s betrayal (‘Gift und Glut’) or his own self- lacerating remorse (‘Heul, du Schaum!’), with its grinding clashes between voice and oboe.”
Gramophone
“The young tenor Gwilym Bowen, as Peter, emerges as one of the most exciting voices on the set.”
Presto Music
J. S. Bach: B Minor Mass / Hyperion CD 2018
“…in the Benedictus, I relished Bowen’s nicely plangent tone which also has an underlying strength.”
Musicweb International
J. S. Bach: Christmas Oratorio / Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment 2018
“Gwilym Bowen was outstanding: his delivery of the Evangelist’s narrative struck the ideal balance of clarity, dramatic flow and tenderness. In the aria Frohe Hirten, where the shepherds are urged to hasten to see the Christ child in the manger, his expressive tenor proved to have great agility, matching that of the fine flute obbligato.”
The Guardian
J. S. Bach: St Matthew Passion / Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra 2018
“The Evangelist, Gwilym Bowen, was a consistently intense presence, plangent and vocally at ease even in the highest-lying sections of his part. This was the most immersed I’ve seen an Evangelist in the drama, at turns grief-stricken and desperate…yet all felt in service of the music, never detracting from it”
Bachtrack
“If Bach’s St Matthew Passion were his opera manqué, then Gwilym Bowen’s Evangelist achieved divo status. He delivered narrative as living drama, never missing a detail or inflection”
New Zealand Herald
Britten: War Requiem / London Philharmonic Orchestra 2018
“The hero of the entire Coventry Cathedral performance evening was the tenor Gwilym Bowen, in the role pioneered by Peter Pears. Bowen could really bellow out Owen’s texts where necessary. But was there ever a more sensitive performance of “Move him into the sun”? I doubt it”
Church Times
J. S. Bach: Christmas Oratorio / Australian Chamber Orchestra 2017
“Vibrant, expressive, agile and dramatic, this crowned an outstanding array of vocal quality throughout the performance.”
Limelight
Eurimaco: Il ritorno d’Ulisse / The Grange Festival 2017
“…attractively sung and superbly acted by Gwilym Bowen.”
Bachtrack
“…Bowen is superb.”
The Guardian
Handel: Messiah / Seattle Symphony Orchestra 2016
“Bowen made the kind of impact not heard here since the lone Messiah appearance in Seattle of the great English tenor Philip Langridge, back in the late 1970s. Lyrical and agile, with considerable expressive depth, Bowen delivered every phrase as if it had just occurred to him, with unfailingly expressive spontaneity. His Thy rebuke was positively heart-rending”
Seattle Times
