The Christmas carols are still echoing in the digital ether when Angel Romeroâs face appears on my computer screen. Heâs just survived his âfifth Christmasâ â a whirlwind of family celebrations. âWe were bouncing from parents to grandparents to other grandparents to my parents,â he says.
Meet Fidel Angel Romero â rising opera star and first-generation American.
His story begins in Stafford, Texas, where his parents landed after fleeing El Salvadorâs civil war. They were teenagers thrust into a world where everything from the language to the street signs might as well have been hieroglyphics. But they had something that no war could take away: a determination to give their children a better life.
âMy parents were about affirmations,â Romero reflects. âThe gifts youâve been given come from the Lord.â Itâs a mantra that would shape not just his faith, but his entire approach to life.
The path to opera wasnât exactly straight. There was the saxophone first â band over choir. Then came the moment that would change everything: The Three Tenors on PBSâs Great Performances. The trio performed âO Sole Mio,â and you can almost see the teenage Angel, transfixed by Pavarotti, Domingo, and Carreras, their voices reaching through the television screen to grab hold of his soul.
But dreams, especially in the arts, donât come with instruction manuals. Romero found himself at Houston Baptist University (now HCU), not by careful planning but through what he calls âa happy accident.â It was there he met his wife, found his voice, and learned that the best paths are the ones you never plan to take.
âWhen I decided to go to a school for music, I ended up at Houston Baptist University. Honestly,â he admits with a smile, âthat wasnât my first choice.â
âI wanted to go to University of North Texas,â Romero recalls. âUNT has the best music school. The best, the biggest. I didnât know anything about Juilliard, I didnât know anything about Boston Conservatory, I didnât know anything about all those other big music schools. I had no idea. I grew up in a very small circle. My brothers all went to UH, so I had no idea that there was anything else out there.â
âWe couldnât afford taking voice lessons. That wasnât an option for us. But my brother gave me 80 bucks to go take this voice lesson with this teacher. It was at Rice University. She took me into a studio and I sang âAve Maria.â and sheâs like, âWow… this is a beautiful gift. I think you could go all the way.ââ
âI am trying to pay out and sheâs like, âNo, no, no… you keep the money.ââ
âFor me, that was my very first experience of someone being generous with their time and telling me that I should be singing,â Romero remembers. âShe said, âI have this perfect friend, and sheâs a professor at Houston Baptist University. She will turn you into a gem.â So, thatâs what I did. I went to Houston Baptist University.â
Romeroâs arrival at HBU was a happy accident. The University ticked all the boxes.
âI grew up in a conservative home,â Romero remembers. âConservative both politically, but also conservative faith-wise. My parents said, âAlways put the Lord first.â They were very happy that I went to a faith-based institution.
One, the proximity from the house – I think it was 15 minutes – and two, I was able to express my faith freely without feeling judged.â
He acknowledges that in spite of a few obstacles, he was meant to stay at HBU.
My voice teacher left the university when I was a freshman, and I was devastated. I said, âIâm going to leave HBU,â and I got accepted into Rice University as an undergraduate.â
But, the Lord had other ideas. âUnfortunately, HBU didnât send my transcripts in time for the transfer deadline, so I ended up having to stay at HBU another year, but it ended up perfectly because I met Dr. David Kirkwood (heâs now my department head) and David became my voice teacher and he showed me the potential I could have.â
âI met my wife at HBU, so if I would have left, I would have never married her. I have some of the best friends in the world that I still stay in touch with, so I was MEANT to stay at HBU. And the Lord just had a funny way of showing me how to do that.â
Talk about the Lord opening all the right doors.
âEveryone who knows me knows that I try to do everything the best that I can,â he says, echoing his parentsâ philosophy. âItâs either you suck or youâre good at it. Thereâs no being mediocre.â Coming from anyone else, that might sound harsh. From Romero, it sounds like love.
Then came the leap – the kind that either makes or breaks an artist. Graduate school at Yale University beckoned, along with other prestigious music schools, but this wasnât just about choosing a graduate program. It was about leaving home for the first time in 21 years, about being the baby brother who finally flew the nest. âIâd never left home before,â Romero remembers, his voice softening. âI was the baby brother and I was gone.â
New Haven became his proving ground, where talent met reality in a head-on collision. âMy teachers never gave me one kind word… not one,â he says.
But they saw something in him â enough to line him up for his apprenticeship at Pittsburgh Opera. He lived in an attic, scraped by on almost nothing, somehow managed to get a dog during the pandemic, and through it all, kept his faith. âIt was all the Lord, really,â he reflects. âHe made something out of nothing.â
The grind of those years â developing his technique, finding his voice â would have broken many. But Romero had inherited his parentsâ immigrant resilience. âMy parents were 15 and 16 when they immigrated to this country,â he reminds me. âThey had to raise a family in the midst of learning a language that they didnât know, being in a community that was strange to them. They had to follow that recipe that itâs not good enough to just be good… you have to be better than good to be able to offer that opportunity to your children.â
The journey since then has been a masterclass in faith and persistence. Through it all, there were the constant questions that haunt every artist: How will I put food on the table? How will I pay the mortgage? âItâs a stress that I donât want to show anybody,â he admits, âbecause itâs a constant battle.â
But then came Vienna State Opera. Operalia in Mumbai. The surprise recognition from OperaWire as one of the top ten rising stars â news he received while sprawled on his couch preparing to watch a Christmas movie with his wife. âWhat a surprise for me,â he says, still sounding amazed. âIt was years of sacrifice and hard work. It showed me that God has me, heâs got my back, heâs going to provide for me, heâs going to take care of me and my family and that my hard work is being noticed.â
Now, at 16 months old, his son Isaac Walker Romero toddles through their home, his name literally meaning âhe who smilesâ – a living reminder of joy in the midst of lifeâs complexities. âHe is a light,â Angel beams. âHe is exactly what the Bible says. Isaac does nothing but smile and bring joy.â When Angelâs not on stage, heâs teaching the next generation of singers at HCU, bringing both faith and hard reality to his lessons. âItâs a dog-eat-dog world,â he tells his students, âItâs no longer good enough to be good… you have to be the best.â
As our conversation winds down, Romero reveals his next big step: Beethovenâs Ninth with the Munich Philharmonic in 2025. His eyes light up as he shares this yet-to-be-announced news, and at that moment, I see what his parents saw all those years ago â a gift meant to be shared with the world.
In the end, Angel Romeroâs story isnât just about opera. Itâs about faith â in God, in family, in the power of art to transform lives. Itâs about a young man from Stafford, Texas, who took his parentsâ dreams and turned them into arias. And most of all, itâs about hope â the kind that echoes long after the last note has faded away.
Angel Romero Work
 Explore Angel Romeroâs performances and see how his passion comes to life.