Hailed by the Boston Globe as “balmy-voiced” and for her “uniformly excellent” performances, mezzo-soprano Katherine Beck sings her first performances of Rosina in Il barbiere di Siviglia with Florentine Opera in the 2022-23 season. Also in Rossini repertoire, she returns to the Lyric Opera of Chicago for its production of Le comte Ory. She partners with Craig Terry in recital at her alma mater, the Crane School of Music at SUNY Potsdam. Last season, she made a return to Arizona Opera for Dorabella in Così fan tutte and joins the Metropolitan Opera for its production of Akhnaten. Also last season, she returned to the Lyric Opera of Chicago for her second year in the prestigious Ryan Opera Center. In the summer, she sang Isabella in Rossini’s rarely performed L’inganno felice with the Opera Festival of Chicago.

She made her debut with the Lyric Opera of Chicago whilst a member of the Ryan Opera Center as Wellgunde in Twilight: Gods, a reimagining of the final chapter of Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen. She also joined Music Director Enrique Mazzola for songs of Donizetti and Verdi on the “Sole e Amore” digital recital program, sang excerpts of Marquise Melibea in Il viaggio a Reims on the Rising Stars Concert, and performed repertoire from classical to jazz to Broadway on concerts online and via WFMT.

She is also an alumna of the Marion Roose Pullin Opera Studio and has previously sung Cherubino in Le nozze di Figaro, Mary Johnson in Spears’ Fellow Travelers, Flora in La traviata, Madeleine Audebert in Puts’ Silent Night, and Catherine Wright in Hagen’s Shining Brow with the company. Ms. Beck made her Santa Fe Opera debut as Karolka in Jenufa while an Apprentice Artist and sang her first performances of Sesto in Giulio Cesare with Pittsburgh Festival Opera. She recently joined Opera Buffs in Los Angeles as Angelina in La cenerentola following earlier performances of Mercedes in Carmen. With Opera Colorado, she created the role of Lisette in Cohen’s Steal a Pencil for Me with Opera Colorado and sang previous performances of La cenerentola in student performances.

She is a two-time Vocal Arts Fellow of the Tanglewood Music Center, at which she was able to indulge her love for art song and chamber music. In the summer of 2018, she premiered Michael Gandolfini’s In America, composed in commemoration of Bernstein’s Songfest, with orchestra. Also there, she sang a recital of French chanson with Roger Vignoles and a concert celebrating humor in music with Stephanie Blythe and Dr. Alan Smith. Elsewhere on the concert stage, she has sung excerpts of La clemenza di Tito with the Phoenix Symphony Orchestra on its Mozart and Schubert Chamber Festival, Mozart’s Requiem at Scripps College, Mendelssohn’s Elijah at Williams College, and Handel’s Messiah for many consecutive years in Arlington, Vermont. She has also been featured at the oldest church in New England in her hometown of Bennington, Vermont, singing Bach’s Geist und Seele wird verwirret, BWV 35 and Vergnügte Ruh, beliebte Seelenlust, BWV 170. In the crossover realm, she joined the Boston Pops both at Symphony Hall and Tanglewood for the premiere of Sondheim and Lapine’s Sondheim on Sondheim.

Ms. Beck is a winner of the prestigious George London Foundation Award, the LuminArts Vocal Fellowship in Chicago, and second place in the Annapolis Opera Vocal Competition. She is also a former semi-finalist of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. She earned her Master of Music degree from the Thornton School of Music at the University of California, at which she sang Béatrice in Béatrice et Bénédict and Sesto in La clemenza di Tito, and her Bachelor of Music degree from the Crane School of Music at the State University of New York at Potsdam.