Tenor Ray M. Wade, Jr. from Texas gained his first stage experience in 1983 at Fort Worth Opera, before moving on to San Francisco Opera and Dayton Opera. In 1993, he made his European debut as Don Ottavio in Mozart’s Don Giovanni in Ghent, Belgium. This was followed by a fixed engagement at the National Theatre in Mannheim, where he learned many roles in the lyric tenor repertoire. He also sang at the Bregenz Festival in Martinů's The Greek Passion. From 2004 to 2009 he was a member of the ensemble of Cologne Opera. He has received critical acclaim recently for his performances as Don Alvaro in Verdi's La forza del destino, Rodolfo in La Bohème, Laca in Janáček's Jenůfa, Turridu in Cavalleria Rusticana, Canio in I Pagliacci and Riccardo in Un ballo in maschera. In 2009 he had a great success as Samson in Saint-Saëns' Samson et Dalila in Cologne, as Pinkerton in Puccini's Madame Butterfly and Salvator Rosa in Antonio Gomes’ Salvator Rosa at Braunschweig State Theatre. Engagements in the near future include a return to the role of Don Alvaro and in spring 2011 his debut in the role of Otello in Verdi's Otello at Heidelberg Theatre.