A member of the prestigious Julliard Opers Center in New York, he sang many leading baritone roles at Lincoln Center, including Ford in Falstaff, Tarquinius in Britten’s Rape of Lucretia, John the Butcher in Hugh the Drover by Vaughn Williams and Neals Lyhne in Fennimore and Gerda by Delius. Franco was the fi rst recipient of the DeRoza prize, the largest award from Julliard. His European debut came as Hamlet at the Gran Teatro del Liceu in Barcelona. The Metropolitan Opera heard him as Schaunard in La Boheme, Count Dominik in Arabella and Presto in Les Mamelles de Tiresias conducted by James Levine. He followed his success with debuts at The Canadian Opera Company as Ford in Verdi’s Falstaff, Los Angeles Opera as Escamillo in Carmen under the baton of Placido Domingo. His Italian debut was Nick Shadow in The Rake’s Progress at Palermo’s Teatro Massimo, he sang the title role in Don Giovanni in Montpellier and Golaud in Pelleas et Melisande as well as four Villains in Les Contes d’Hoffmann for the Nationale Reisopera in the Netherlands. In contemporary opera, he played Stanley Kowalski in Previn’s A Streetcar Named Desire and Frank Chambers in The Postman Always Rings Twice by Stephen Paulus.