A captivating and compelling artist, Emily Rocha is a Canadian soprano with Portuguese and Kiwi heritage. She is currently a member of the Canadian Opera Company Ensemble Studio.

The season ahead holds many exciting roles for Emily: at the Canadian Opera Company she sings Countess Ceprano and the Page (Rigoletto), and covers Gilda (Rigoletto), Juliette (Roméo et Juliette), Euridice (Orfeo ed Euridice), and Sophie (Werther). During the summer 2025 season she debuts with the National Ballet of Canada in Anna Karenina as the soprano soloist, Laurie (The Tender Land) with Toronto City Opera, and the title role in The Merry Widow with Highlands Opera Studio.

During the 2024-2025 season, she made her mainstage debut as Kate Pinkerton (Madama Butterfly) at the Canadian Opera Company, where she also covered Anna (Nabucco), studied Marguerite (Faust), and was the 3rd Prize Winner at the 2025 Quilico Awards. With the COC Ensemble Studio, she performed in the Big Lake Arts Festival’s Opera Gala. She was a 2024 Vocal Fellow at the Tanglewood Music Festival, most notably performing Adela Maddison’s Cinq Mélodies, Ach ich fühl’s with the TMCO, and premiering Ileana Perez Velazquez’s Vuelo as part of the Festival of Contemporary Music.

Emily made several operatic debuts during the 2023-2024 season, including Micaela (Carmen) with Southern Ontario Lyric Opera, Adina (L’elisir d’amore) with the North York Concert Orchestra, and Gilda (Rigoletto) in concert with Opera by Request in Toronto. She performed her first Mahler Rückert-Lieder with the University of Toronto Symphony Orchestra as the 2023 Concerto Competition Winner, Orff’s Carmina Burana as a soloist at the Meridian Arts Centre in collaboration with North York Concert Orchestra and Pax Christi Chorale, and as a featured soloist with the Durham Youth Orchestra and the North York Concert Orchestra. She earned exciting accolades this season, including the 2nd Prize at COC Centre Stage: Ensemble Studio Competition at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, District Winner in the Metropolitan Opera Eric and Dominique Laffont Competition (Tulsa District), Encouragement Award at the George and Nora London Foundation Competition Finals, and Semi-Finalist in the first edition of the Cascais Opera Competition. She was recognized for her achievements by her birthplace with a Culture Counts Emerging Artist Award from the Mayor of Oshawa and the City Council.

Previously, Emily has offered dazzling performances as Susanna (Le Nozze di Figaro), Ernestine (M. Choufleuri restera chez lui le…), Cunegonde (Candide - cover), Cassandra (Disobedience - premiere), Lucie Manette (A Tale of Two Cities), Erste Dame (Die Zauberflöte), Zerlina (Don Giovanni), and Beth Moss (The Tender Land).

As the soprano soloist, Emily has performed Fauré’s Requiem (Northumberland Orchestra and Choir) and Beethoven’s Mass in C (Resound Choir).  

Equally at home in contemporary music, Emily workshopped excerpts as Justine for the new opera Melancholia (Karlsson, Vavrek), which premiered in 2023 at the Kungliga Operan. She premiered Emanuele D’Onofrio’s Four Songs after Louise Glück, The Song my Paddle Sings (Larysa Kuzmenko), “One Day” (Emma Moss), Winter Songs (Kai Leung), The Last Moments of Our Seasons (Moss), and “Recuerdo” in the East Coast premiere of Beauty Intolerable by Sheila Silver (SongFest 2022). At SongFest, Emily was a 2022 Colburn Foundation Fellow, collaborating with esteemed artists Graham Johnson, Martin Katz, Frederica von Stade, Jake Heggie, John Harbison, Amy Burton, John Musto, Sheila Silver, Mark Trawka, Javier Arrebola, Martha Guth, and César Ulloa.

Emily is a 2023 MMus graduate of the University of Toronto Opera School, and a 2021 Honors BMus graduate of the U of T Voice Performance program, both under the tutelage of Lorna MacDonald. Earlier successes for Emily include an Encouragement Award at the Metropolitan Opera Eric and Dominique Laffont Competition 2023 (Illinois District), Winner of the 2023 UTSO Concerto Competition with Mahler’s Rückert-Lieder, 1st Prize in the Toronto Mozart Competition, and U of T’s prestigious Ivan Alexandor Chorney Opera Scholarship (2022). At U of T, she had unique opportunities to perform for John R. Stratton Visitor in Music Master Classes with Joyce DiDonato, Eric Owens, and Margo Garrett.