Elena O'Connor |
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Elena O'Connor, soprano Soprano Elena O'Connor happily makes her debut with Mercury Opera Rochester in the role of Musetta in Puccini's La Bohème. Previously, she has sung the role under Julius Rudel and the direction of Ed Berkeley at the Aspen Music Festival. She has also appeared as Gilda in Rigoletto and Micaela in Carmen, at the Aspen Music Festival, where she is also a winner of the Festival's Vocal Concerto Competition. Other honors she has received come from Mobile Opera's Rose Palmai-Tenser Competition, the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, and the Palm Beach Opera International Vocal Competition, where she was a winner two consecutive years. With Palm Beach Opera, Ms. O'Connor toured as the title role in their production of Roberts Chauls's Alice in Wonderland and performed several concerts throughout South Florida with Maestro Kamal Khan. A native of Rochester, New York, Ms. O'Connor did her undergraduate studies at Eastman and the University of Miami School of Music, where she sang the role of Francesca in the U.S. premiere of Luigi Mancinelli's Paolo e Francesca, South Florida's Sun-Sentinel calling her portrayal "stunning." She was also recently mentioned in the New York Times for her "standout" performance at Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall in Scott Joplin's Treemonisha with the Collegiate Chorale. As an art song enthusiast, Ms. O'Connor has been a three-time fellow with the University of Miami's Lieder program in Salzburg, Austria. There, as an honoree of the Schloss-Leopoldskron Competition, she was featured in concerts around the city and worked in masterclasses with Helen Donath and the late Jerry Hadley. In the summer of 2006, she was a member of the Ravinia Festival's Steans Institute Program for Singers under the auspices of James Conlon and Margo Garrett, where she studied and performed works of Schumann, Rachmaninoff and Poulenc. Also under the auspices of Maestro Conlon, Ms. O'Connor was one of the youngest ever featured soloists in the long history of the Cincinnati May Festival, performing the soprano role in Bach's Cantata No. 21 under Robert Porco, Cincinnati's Enquirer referring to her "a young star to watch." She currently resides in New York City. |