“Transit and music connect us”: BART Customer Services Center worker is also an opera singer

Taylor Thompson has the sort of voice that makes you stop in your tracks. Smooth and strong, his tenor range hits each note with precision and accuracy.

Thompson is a store clerk in BART’s Customer Services Center at Lake Merritt Station. He is also an established opera singer, having performed in productions across the Bay Area.

After graduating from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music in 2013, Thompson returned to the Bay Area, where he grew up. He’s performed in dozens of operas, ranging from “Carmen” and “Rigoletto” to “L’enfant et les sortileges.” He’s auditioned for “The Voice” and “American Idol.” He’s performed the National Anthem at 49ers games three times. And during the day, he works at BART, helping people get where they need to go.

For Thompson, the BART job is personal. Three years ago, he was diagnosed with epilepsy after having a seizure at work. He’s no longer able to drive.

“Public transit is literally a lifeline for me,” he said recently, sitting outside Lake Merritt Station on his lunch break.

And music is more related to public transportation than you might think. “Transit and music connect us,” he said.

“BART has taken me to college auditions, important events, interviews,” he said. “It gets people to the places they need to be. I wanted to come be a part of it.”

Thompson’s BART journey began almost ten years ago when he interned in the Office of External Affairs and Communications, fresh out of university. He went back to BART earlier this year in search of a steady job and income to support him while he pursues singing. He laughed as he said he must stop himself from busting out a tune while working in the Customer Services Center. It’s after he leaves work at BART that the performer side of himself flourishes.

Thompson has been singing since he was a child. He said his talent was “discovered” in preschool, when he started singing along to “The Bodyguard” soundtrack his teacher was listening to.

“She calls my mom and says, ‘Listen to your son!’” he said. “I was just four-years-old, but they said I can and should sing.”

Thompson comes from a musical family. His parents live in Fairfield, and his father plays the saxophone, piano, and the organ during church services. Thompson’s grandfather was in the U.S. Army band. Thompson said his grandpa died while listening to him sing the National Anthem at Candlestick Park – “As the Blue Angels soared overhead, so did my grandfather’s spirit.”

At church, Thompson sang exclusively with the adults. His voice, he said, was simply “too big” for the children’s choir.

In the meantime, he works at BART during the day and sings in the evenings with a variety of classical companies around the Bay Area. He said he likes his BART job because it’s stable, and he can leave work at work.

“Sales, transactions, and all that is left here,” he said. “Once the job is done, it’s done, and I appreciate that.”

And BART’s competitive pay helps keep him afloat between gigs.

“BART is one of the few places in the Bay Area you can come as an entry-level employee and make a living wage,” he said. “Salads here are literally $20!”

Thompson also wants to give back. While performing in a production of “Carmen” with Opera San Jose, he took public transit every day from Vallejo to the South Bay. Rehearsals ended at 10 p.m., and he’d run to the BART station to catch the last train. Late at night, he saw the Bay Area’s homelessness problem firsthand, and it became “personal.”

“They looked not far away from me,” he said. “I didn’t have a regular job, I was two degrees away from them, it could have been me.”

Currently, Thompson is researching how he can help. He thinks there’s a lack of late-night services for individuals without homes in the Bay Area, and he wants to change that.

“I want to be an example to others like me,” he said.

As Thompson’s lunch break ended, he had time to perform a handful of songs outside the station. You can watch him sing in the video above.