He debuted at the Bayreuth Festival in 1958 as Siegmund in Die Walküre and sang Parsifal there in 1964. Later negotiations with Wieland Wagner concerning appearances as Siegfried in Götterdämmerung ended with Wieland's death in 1966. His debut role at the Metropolitan Opera in 1960 was Canio in Pagliacci. He appeared at the Met for 22 seasons in 277 performances of 17 roles, including Florestan in Fidelio, Siegmund, Don Jose in Carmen, Radamès in Aida, Erik in The Flying Dutchman, Herman in Tchaikovsky's Queen of Spades, the Samsons of both Handel and Saint-Saëns, Otello, Don Alvaro in La forza del destino, Peter Grimes, Énée in Les Troyens, Tristan, Laca in Jenůfa, Vasek in The Bartered Bride, and Parsifal, giving his farewell in 1987. At the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden in London he sang Tristan, Britten's Peter Grimes, Handel's Samson - and, above all, Énée. He later recorded Énée with Sir Colin Davis. In 1959, he was the tenor in a legendary and controversial recording of Handel's Messiah with Sir Thomas Beecham.
Although scheduled to sing Tannhäuser at Covent Garden in the late 1970s, Vickers dropped out, claiming he could not empathize with the character, and that the opera itself was blasphemous in nature. He did, however, sing Nerone in L'incoronazione di Poppea at the Paris Opéra, plus Alvaro in La forza del destino at the Met (1975). His roles also included Don Carlos, Andrea Chenier, Herod in Salome, Giasone in Medea (with Maria Callas in the title role), Pollione in Norma and such rarely heard parts as Cellini in Berlioz's Benvenuto Cellini, Ratan-Sen in Roussel's Padmavati and Sergei in Shostakovitch's Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District. Many critics praised his interpretation of Verdi's Otello, which he recorded twice: in 1960 with Tullio Serafin and 1973 with Herbert von Karajan. Vickers also was a long time collaborator with American pianist Richard Woitach.
Vickers starred in made-for-television films of his Pagliacci and Otello, both conducted by Karajan, and premiered the 1978 season of Live from the Met with Otello.
Vickers further sang at the 'home' of Italian opera, Milan's La Scala, as well as in the major opera houses of Chicago, San Francisco, Vienna, and at the Salzburg Festival. He retired in 1988.
In 1998, he made his first recording as a reciter, in Richard Strauss's melodrama Enoch Arden, accompanied on piano by Marc-André Hamelin.
In 1953 he married Henrietta (Hetty) Outerbridge. They had five children. (Wikipedia)
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