Scottish Opera, February 2022

“Jonathan McGovern’s forthright Demetrius, Charlie Drummond’s determined Helena, Lea Shaw’s vulnerable Hermia and Elgan Llŷr Thomas’ bold Lysander each make a clear impact as a distinctive entity while communally charting their absurdly convoluted emotional round-dance with conviction as well as neatness.”

George Hall, The Stage *****

“The Athenians were vocally well balanced but with strong individual characters. Elgan Llŷr Thomas was an intrepid Lysander opposite Charlie Drummond's strongminded Helena.”

David Smythe, Bachtrack *****

“The quartet of confused lovers is mesmerisingly agile: Elgan Llŷr Thomas (something of a Hugh Grant lookalike) as a quicksilver Lysander…”

Ken Walton, The Scotsman *****

“Perhaps it’s true that the music for the four mixed-up lovers is less striking than the rest but as Hermia and Helena, Lea Shaw and Charlie Drummond project it strongly, as do Lysander and Demetrius (Elgan Llŷr Thomas and Jonathan McGovern)…“

Nicholas Kenyon, The Telegraph ****

“Jonathan McGovern’s Demetrius, Charlie Drummond’s Helena, Lea Shaw’s Hermia and Elgan Llŷr Thomas’s Lysander – all singers to watch – found maximum character in the quartet of lovers.”

Fiona Maddocks, The Guardian

English National Opera, October 2021

“Proper operatic casting makes you treasure the beauty in so much of Sullivan’s writing, especially for his young lovers. The Mendelssohnian reverie of beauteous tar Ralph Rackstraw’s entrance sequence is richly served both by the orchestra and by Elgan Llŷr Thomas, with an Italianate throb in the voice and top notes to die for...”

David Nice, The Arts Desk ****

“Elgan Llŷr Thomas and Alexandra Oomens ooze charm and sweet lyricism...”

Richard Morrison, The Times ****

“Musically it’s very fine [...] Thomas and Oomens are lovely in their duets and arias.”

Tim Ashley, The Guardian

“The Welsh tenor, Elgan Llŷr Thomas, has a golden tenor voice which can weep as well as it can soar.”

Jack Buckley, Seen and Heard International

“Young artists Elgan Llŷr Thomas (Ralph Rackstraw) and Alexandra Oomens (Josephine) sing the socks off the central love-story.”

Alexandra Coghlan, The Independent ****

“Elgan Llŷr Thomas looks like Hugh Grant and sings with touching ardour...”

Nick Kimberley, The Evening Standard

“…sailor Ralph Rackstraw, attractively sung by tenor Elgan Llŷr Thomas...”

Claudia Pritchard, Culture Whisper ****

“Elgan Llŷr gives us a charming, lovelorn Ralph Rackstraw...”

Gary Naylor, Broadway World ****

“It’s very well sung, too. As the two young lovers, Elgan Llyr Thomas and Alexandra Oomens, both ENO Harewood artists, make the Coliseum’s rafters ring with some splendidly fresh singing.”

David Mellor, In Entertainment

“ENO has put two of its young Harewood artists at the centre of the show: Alexandra Oomens’ Josephine and Elgan Llŷr Thomas’s Ralph [...] the latter was also admirably authentic, gliding smoothly around the relatively undemanding vocal writing: all the less room to hide, of course. Both were guilelessly melodramatic, as it should be, to offset that larks.”

Benjamin Poore, Opera Wire

“Elgan Llyr Thomas’ Ralph was precise and pleasant.”

Robert Thicknesse, Opera Now

Tŷ Cerdd (TCR031), June 2021

“...excellent disc of contemporary Welsh song, featuring a glittering roster of Welsh singers…Huw Watkins’s mesmerising ‘Eyes look into the well’, sung with haunting beauty by Elgan Llyr Thomas...”

Kate Wakeling, BBC Music Magazine ****

“Elgan Llyr Thomas sounds lyrical, handsome and impulsive in William Mathias’s ‘Pan Oddwn Fachgen’ (‘A Dream of Youth’)”

Tim Ashley, Gramophone

Scottish Opera, July 2021

“Gemma Summerfield and Elgan Llyr Thomas give a particularly glowing account of the young lovers Nannetta and Fenton.”

Rowena Smith, The Guardian ****

“The vocal stars of the show are Gemma Summerfield’s big-voiced Nanetta, Elgan Llyr Thomas and a deluxe trio of Falstaff’s sidekicks: Aled Hall, Alastair Miles and Jamie MacDougall.”

Hugh Canning, The Sunday Times

“...Fenton, ardently characterised by Elgan Llÿr Thomas...”

Ken Walton, The Scotsman *****

“Elgan Llŷr Thomas was a sweetly love-struck Fenton”

David Smythe, Bachtrack ****

“…Phillip Rhodes (Ford), Elgan Llŷr Thomas (Fenton), Aled Hall (Dr Caius) and Jamie MacDougall (Bardolph) all played their part in this happy mosaic.”

Andrew Clark, Opera Magazine

“...an intimate scene between the young lovers – Nannetta and Fenton – sung with fresh vivacity by Gemma Summerfield and Elgan Llyr Thomas...”

Susan Nickalls, Opera Now ****

Grange Park Opera (film), March 2021

“Llŷr Thomas makes a fine Gonzalve, darker and weightier in tone than most”

Tim Ashley, The Guardian, 21 March 2021 ****

“Welsh tenor Elgan Llyr Thomas convinces as the young poet Gonzalve”

Alice Fowler, The Guildford Dragon, March 2021

“...the fluid phrasing and Gallic tang of Thomas's dapper-sounding tenor”

Richard Bratby, The Arts Desk, 30 March 2021 ****

“The small cast keep things sizzling. What we lose in Ravel’s miraculous play of instrumental colour we gain in quick-fire, conversational rhythms of music that stick as close to speech as possible. Except, that is, for Gonzalve (a deliciously ardent, overblown Elgan Llyr Thomas) who turns the simplest exchange into a musical sonnet.”

Alexandra Coghlan, The i, 26 March 2021 ****

“GPO’s singers, under Medcalf’s direction, succeed admirably [...] Elgan Llŷr Thomas as the handsome, posy Gonzalve, and Ashley Riches [...] play their parts with tremendous gusto.”

Hugh Canning, The Times, 28 March 2021

“Elgan Llŷr Thomas was in a comically lustrous voice as Gonzalve, extravagant in delivery and sense of line, more entranced by the clocks adorning the walls and his own poetic genius than poor Concepción.”

Benjamin Poore, OperaWire, 27 March 2021

“Elgan Llŷr Thomas, who leads the cast in matters of Gallic style, is a dizzily elegant, vocally airborne Gonzalve”

Yehuda Shapiro, Opera Magazine, June 2021

“Elgan Llŷr Thomas is every bit as annoying as the self-absorbed poet Gonsalve as he needs to be Ivan Hewett”

The Telegraph, 19 March 2021

The Rake’s Progress at Snape Maltings 2019

“Elgan Llyr Thomas sang Tom Rakewell with terrific verve.”

Richard Morrison, The Times

“The Suffolk contingent was led in rapturous fashion by Elgan Llyr Thomas as Tom Rakewell. With a voice that’s exquisetely modulated and flexible in creating character, this young tenor confirmed his status as one of the most exciting British male talents to have emerged in recent years.”

Mark Valencia, Opera Magazine