Some of these include the roles of Stephano (Adès The Tempest) at the Royal Opera, Covent Garden; Kublai Khan in Tan Dun's Marco Polo at the Netherlands Opera, and The Emperor in Tea at Suntory Hall, Tokyo; Gerald Barry's The Triumph of Beauty and Deceit, The Conquest Of Ireland , The Intelligence Park and Beethoven ; Tavener's Eis Thanaton, Resurrection, The Apocalypse and Fall and Resurrection with City of London Sinfonia at St Paul's Cathedral; and The Commander (Ruder's The Handmaid's Tale) in the British premiere for English National Opera.

Apart from his personal commitment to performing New Music , Stephen Richardson performs traditional repertoire regularly. For ENO he has also sung Baron Ochs (Der Rosenkavalier) and Daland (The Flying Dutchman). He has appeared in Biily Budd at the Royal Opera Covent Garden and L Opéra de Paris, Bastille. He has recently made his debut at Opera Australia in the title rôle of Verdi s Falstaff and Sarastro in Die Zauberflöte. Last Season he performed Adès  Powder Her Face at the New Mariinsky Concert Hall in St.Petersburg.

Stephen has appeared in many major international opera houses and festivals in over one hundred different roles. Such houses include La Scala,Milano , Santa Fe Opera, Chicago Lyric, Salzburg Festspiele, The Royal Opera, Covent Garden, The Netherlands Opera, Opera de Paris, Hong Kong Festival, Canadian Opera and Opera Australia.

Since his professional début in 1981, Stephen has appeared as soloist with some of the worlds leading orchestras and ensembles, most notably The Cleveland Orchestra, The London Symphony Orchestra, The Vienna Philharmonic, The London Philharmonic Orchestra, The Philharmonia, The Philadelphia Orchestra,The Prague Symphony, The Boston Symphony Orchestra, The NHK in Tokyo and many more. An impressive list of his conductors range from Muti and Maazel to Pinnock and Sir Colin Davis.

Future appearances will include the role of Rocco in Fidelio, Ashby in La Fanciulla del West  in Denmark , Flint in Billy Budd  at the Netherlands Opera, and Henry VIII in Peter Maxwell DaviesTaverner.