Born in Adelaide, Grant graduated with Honours from the University of Adelaide, winning the Elder Scholarship to continue his studies on the Opera School at the Royal College of Music, subsequently winning a place on the Jette Parker Young Artists Programme at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. During his studies, he was awarded many other prizes, including the Arnold Matters Scholarship, Bathurst Singer of the Year, Royal Over League overseas Prize, Lies Askonas Prize, Madeleine Finden Trust, and won the International Mozart Competition. He was also supported by the Tait Memorial Trust, the Royal Overseas League and the Victoria League for Commonwealth Friendship.
For the Royal Opera he has performed over a dozen roles including Ping Turandot, Small Prisoner/Cekunov From the House of the Dead, Dancaire & Morales Carmen, Harlequin Ariadne auf Naxos, Schaunard La bohème, and Billy Wayne Smith in the world premiere of Anna Nicole. He has appeared regularly in the Linbury Studio Theatre as Tarquinius Rape of Lucretia, Demetrius A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Abraham Clemency and White Rabbit Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.
Major opera credits include Robert in Tchaikovksy’s Iolantha, Yeletsky Pikyava Dama, Zurga Les pêcheurs de perles, Marcello La bohème, for Opera Holland Park; Forester Cunning Little Vixen, the title role in Don Giovanni and Count Almaviva Le nozze di Figaro for Garsington Opera; Sir Thomas Mansfield Park for The Grange Festival; Figaro Barber of Seville, Papageno The Magic Flute, Marcello and Figaro Le nozze di Figaro for Longborough Festival Opera; Demetrius A Midsummers Night’s Dream at the Teatro Real in Madrid and Komische Oper Berlin, Ned Keene Peter Grimes in Gran Canaria, Mike in John Adams’ I Was Looking at the Ceiling for Teatro dell’Opera in Rome as well as singing Count Almaviva with the Xi’an Symphony Orchestra in China. He has appeared with Opera North, starring as Robin Oakapple in Gilbert & Sullivan’s Ruddigore and sang Marcello La bohème at the Royal Albert Hall and also Schaunard La bohème for Glyndebourne Touring Opera.
As a regular with English Touring Opera, he has sung the title role in Macbeth, Orestes in Gluck’s Iphigénie en Tauride, Marcello, Hector King Priam, Eduardo L’assedio di Calais, Paolo Simon Boccanegra, Emireno Ottone, Tiridate Radamisto, and Nello in Pia de’ Tolomei, a UK stage premiere. He played Abraham in James MacMillan’s Clemency directed by Katie Mitchell for ROH2 and revived for Scottish Opera at the 2012 Edinburgh Festival.
In his native Australia, Grant has sung Zurga Les pêcheurs de perles for Opera Queensland, as well as Don Giovanni, Count Almaviva, Zurga and Starbuck in Jake Heggie’s Moby Dick for State Opera of South Australia for which he won a Helpmann Award for Best Male Performer in a Supporting Role.
His CDs include live recordings as Orestes in Iphigénie en Tauride for Pinchgut Opera in Sydney and Phillip II in the premiere of Isaac Nathan’s ballad opera Don John of Austria, for ABC Classics with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra.
He played the lead role of Arthur Stace in the Channel 4/ABC film Jonathon Mills’ The Eternity Man, which won the 2009 Rose d’Or Award for Best Performing Arts programme; he also recorded the Forester for the BBC animated film of The Cunning Little Vixen with the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin as well as taking the role of Carlo in Judith Weir’s film opera Armida for Channel 4 TV.
As a busy concert soloist, Grant has performed Carmina Burana with the Australian Ballet, Birmingham Royal Ballet, the Bach Choir at the Royal Festival Hall, Royal Philharmonic under Daniele Gatti, Crouch End Festival Chorus/Barbican, the Ulster Orchestra as well as for Raymond Gubbay at the Royal Albert Hall. Other performances include Bach Christmas Oratorio with the Copenhagen Philharmonic, Elijah (Blackheath Halls), Brahms’ Ein Deutches Requiem (Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra; Bach Choir/Philharmonia at Westminster Cathedral), Britten’s War Requiem (Hertfordshire Chorus; Huddersfield Choral Society, Sinfonia ViVa), Fauré Requiem (Hallé Orchestra; Carl Davis), Vaughan-Williams A Sea Symphony (Crouch End Festival Chorus/Barbican), Christus/Arias St Matthew Passion (CBSO/Ex Cathedra), Kurt Weill Seven Deadly Sins (The Hallé/Sir Mark Elder), Tippett’s A Child of Our Time (CEFC) and Christus St John Passion (Irish Chamber Orchestra), and Messiah with the Nottingham Harmonic Choir, York Minster and also with the Royal Choral Society at the Royal Albert Hall.
He appears regularly as a soloist in Raymond Gubbay concerts such as Classical Spectacular and Last Night of the Proms as well as concerts with Sinfonia ViVa including their Darley Park outdoor concerts to audiences of over 30,000.
Future and recent engagements include Enric the world premiere of The Skating Rink by David Sawer, commissioned by Garsington Opera, Forester in Cunning Little Vixen for Opera Holland Park, Vater in Mark Anthony Turnage’s Coraline for Opernhaus Zurich, King Dodon in The Golden Cockerel for ETO, Don Bartolo The Barber of Seville & Don Magnifico for Nevill Holt Opera and Tonio Pagliacci for West Green Opera. In 2024 he will sing Il Tesoriere in Verdi’s Un giorno di Regno for Garsington Opera and Old Sam in Bernstein’s A Quiet Place for the Royal Opera.