Jorge Chaminé (born 30 April 1956 in Porto, Portugal) is a Portuguese operatic baritone.
Of Spanish and Portuguese parentage, he began his musical studies (piano, voice, cello, guitar, choral and orchestra conducting) at an early age. After studying law at Coimbra University, he decided to become a singer and received a scholarship from the Gulbenkian Foundation to further his studies in Madrid, Paris, Munich, and in New York City with personalities like Lola Rodriguez Aragon, Teresa Berganza and Hans Hotter.
He made his Carnegie Hall debut with Seiji Ozawa and the Boston Symphony Orchestra and has also performed with the London Symphony Orchestra, the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, the Berlin Symphony, and the Ensemble Intercontemporain among others. In 1988, he won the Menuhin Foundation Award which led him to perform internationally under the direction of Yehudi Menuhin. He has appeared with Claudio Scimone, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, Plácido Domingo, Michel Corboz, and Ros Marbà, and appeared in opera performances and concerts alongside Mirella Freni, Montserrat Caballé and Teresa Berganza.
He is equally at home in the English, French, German, Russian, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese languages and repertory.
He is a regular performer of tango, boleros, gypsy songs, fado and the songs of Vinicius de Moraes and Jobim—the music and languages of his own origins. He has recorded for Lyrinx, RCA, Harmonia Mundi, Naïve, ADDA, Sons Croisés/Exodos and BMG.
Chaminé has won a number of honours, prizes and awards. He is frequently invited as a guest teacher and gives master classes in a number of music academies in Europe, U.S., Canada and Brazil. He is at the origin of a workshop Sons Croisés for musicians of all disciplines which is held regularly at the Spanish College in Paris (Colegio de España). More than 200 musicians from 47 countries worked with him in these Workshops.
He is president-Artistic Director of the CIMA Festival in Tuscany. He is also vice-president of the Georges Bizet Association. He was nominated Music Ambassador of the organisation Music in ME (Music in Middle East)at the Unesco in May 2005. Since then he is also member of the Board of Directors of Music in ME International and president of Music in ME France. He created and is the Artistic Director of the Festival Ibériades and the Artistic Director of the Festival de Bougival. He received from Federico Mayor the Human Rights Medal of the Unesco.