he made his first appearance with at an actual opera house as the title hero in Charles Gounod's Faust with Cincinnati Opera. The following fall he once again traveled with the Charles Wagner Opera Company, this time singing Don José in Bizet's Carmen opposite Sill's Micaëla. Over the next five years he appeared in several houses throughout the United States including the Baltimore Opera Company and the Houston Grand Opera. In 1957 Alexander made his debut with the Philadelphia Grand Opera Company as Lieutenant Pinkerton in Puccini's Madama Butterfly opposite Dorothy Kirsten as Cio-Cio San. That same year he made his first appearance with the New York City Opera singing the role of Alfredo. The following year he returned to the New York City Opera to portray the role of Henry Morosus for the United States premiere of Richard Strauss's Die schweigsame Frau. He continued to perform periodically at the New York City Opera up through the 1970s, notably excelling as Walther in Wagner's Die Meistersinger and as Bacchus in Richard Strauss's Ariadne auf Naxos. In 1958 he created the role of Lucentio is the first staged performance of Vittorio Giannini's The Taming of the Shrew. On February 10, 1958, Alexander portrayed the role of Rodolfo opposite Elaine Malbin's Mimì in Giacomo Puccini's La bohème for the very first opera performance given by the Philadelphia Lyric Opera Company. He returned several more times for performances with that company, including portrayals of Vicomte Camille de Jolidon in Die lustige Witwe (1958), Lieutenant Pinkerton (1959, 1962, 1963), Sir Edgardo di Ravenswood in Lucia di Lammermoor (1960, 1961), Ferrando in Così fan tutte (1960), Alfredo (1961, 1963, 1972), Faust (1967), Gennaro in Lucrezia Borgia (1969), and Roberto, conte di Leicester in Maria Stuarda (1974). Later life and career In 1961 Alexander joined the roster of the Metropolitan Opera where he sang regularly for the next 26 years. He made his first appearance on the Met stage as Ferrando in Così fan tutte on December 19, 1961, with Teresa Stich-Randall as Fiordiligi, Rosalind Elias as Dorabella, Theodor Uppman as Guglielmo, Roberta Peters as Despina, and Frank Guarrera as Don Alfonso. His other roles at the Met included Alfredo, Anatol in Barber's Vanessa, Arbace, Belmonte, Don Carlos, Cassio in Otello, Cavaradossi in Tosca, Des Grieux in Manon, Des Grieux in Manon Lescaut, the Duke of Mantua, Edgardo, Eisenstein in Die Fledermaus, Elvino in La Sonnambula,