Juan Pons is recognised worldwide as one of the leading dramatic baritones of our time. He was born in Ciutadella (Menorca) and studied at the town's Salesian College. He gained worldwide attention in December 1980 when he opened the season at La Scala in Milan in the title role of Falstaff in Giorgio Strehler's production, conducted by Lorin Maazel. He returned to La Scala a month later to make his equally acclaimed debut as Tonio in Franco Zeffirelli's production of I Pagliacci. Since then he has sung regularly at La Scala, having performed in works such as Tosca, La Traviata, La Fanciulla del West, Gianni Schicchi, Cavalleria Rusticana, etc.

Throughout his career, Juan Pons has sung regularly in the most prestigious opera companies in the world, including the Vienna State Opera, the Royal Opera House in London, the Opéra de la Bastille in Paris, the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, Hamburg and Zurich, the Gran Teatro del Liceo in Barcelona, the Teatro de la Zarzuela in Madrid, the Teatro Real in Madrid, the Operas of Rome and Florence, La Fenice in Venice, the Teatro Comunale in Bologna, the Teatro Regio in Parma, the Arena in Verona, the Terme di Caracalla, etc.

He made his debut at the Metropolitan in 1983 with Il Trovatore and since then has appeared regularly in its programme, having performed Rigoletto, Un ballo in maschera - conducted by James Levine -, La Traviata, Aida, I Pagliacci, Madame Butterfly and Lucia di Lammermoor among others. He sang with Plácido Domingo and Luciano Pavarotti at the opening of the Metropolitan's 1994/95 season. In addition to his premieres in Il Tabarro and I Pagliacci in the 1994/95 season, he also sang Rigoletto, Tosca and La Traviata and is one of the few singers who have not been absent from the Met's programme since his debut in 1983.

In the United States he has also sung in Chicago, Dallas, Washington D. C., San Diego and San Francisco.

In 1992 he also appeared as a special guest at the Opening Ceremony of the Barcelona Olympic Games, an event which was broadcast live on television to an estimated international audience of one billion people. In the same year he participated in the Seville Expo.

In 1993 he made his debut at the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires in Puccini's Tosca, returning in 1997 for a recital with June Anderson and in 2011 for Il Tabarro and Gianni Schicchi.

In January 2010 he took part in the gala tribute to Plácido Domingo's 70th birthday at the Teatro Real in Madrid, performing excerpts from Othello and Falstaff. In July 2012, he bid farewell to the Gran Teatro del Liceo in Barcelona, performing the role of Amonasro in Verdi's opera Aida. He ended his career as a staged opera singer on stage, performing the role of "Sharpless" in the opera "Madame Butterfly" by Giacomo Puccini on 26 May 2013 at the oldest opera house in Spain, the Teatro Principal de Mahón.

The Teatro del Liceo in Barcelona, where he began his career in 1970, paid tribute to his professional career in 2014. He returned temporarily to the stage in 2015 to play the role of Scarpia alongside the Italian Ambrogio Maestri in the performance of Tosca. This production was a collaboration between the Teatro del Liceo de Barcelona and the Teatro Maestranza. It could be seen on stage in Seville on 29 May, 1,4,7,10 and 13 June of that year.

In 2014 he was awarded, together with the Teatro Principal de Maó, the Gold Medal for Merit in the Fine Arts by the Spanish Government.