[2][3] At Occidental College his teachers included Robert Arthur Gross (viola) and Howard Swan (voice), and at Juilliard he studied conducting with Jean Morel and Frederic Waldman.
[2][3] In New York he continued to pursue vocal studies, first with Austrian tenor and Juilliard School voice teacher Hans Joachim Heinz (1961–1964), and then Beverley Peck Johnson (1964–69).
[3] In 1961 Paul made his debut at Carnegie Hall performing with the Cantata Singers and conductor Thomas Dunn as Gobryas in George Frideric Handel's Belshazzar with soprano Saramae Endich as Nitocris of Babylon, Florence Kopleff as the prophet Daniel, Betty Allen as Cyrus the Great, and tenor Charles Bressler in the tile role.
[13][14] Paul performed in several productions with the San Francisco Opera in the 1960s, including the roles of the Speaker in Mozart's The Magic Flute (1963), Sparafucile in Giuseppe Verdi's Rigoletto (1963), Colline in Giacomo Puccini's La bohème (1964), and Nourabad in Georges Bizet's Les pêcheurs de perles (1964).
[16] That same year he returned to Carnegie Hall to portray Daniel Webster in Virgil Thomson's The Mother of Us All with the American Opera Society,[17] was the bass soloist in both Bach's Gott fähret auf mit Jauchzen, BWV 43 and Schubert's Mass No.
[22] On July 19, 1968 he was a soloist in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony for the grand opening of the Blossom Music Center with soprano Phyllis Curtin, mezzo Jane Hobson, tenor Ernst Haefliger, conductor George Szell and The Cleveland Orchestra.
[20] He performed with that orchestra again in 1970 as Friar Lawrence in Hector Berlioz's Roméo et Juliette with tenor George Shirley, mezzo Anna Reynolds, and conductor Pierre Boulez.
[1] In 1978 he performed in the world premiere of Elliott Carter's Syringa, a work dedicated to British music critic William Glock and using English words by the American poet John Ashbery in addition to text by Ancient Greek writers like Homer and Plato.
[25] Conductor Harvey Sollberger led the premiere's musical's forces which in addition to Paul included mezzo-soprano Jan DeGaetani and the Speculum Musicae chamber ensemble.
[25] Carter had specifically composed the work for Paul and DeGaetaini, who in addition to being fellow voice teachers at the Eastman School of Music, were frequent collaborators as performing artists.
[31] That same year he performed the role of Arkel in Claude Debussy's Pelléas et Mélisande in a concert version of the opera with the Philadelphia Orchestra and conductor Dennis Russell Davies.