A PASSIONATE PERFORMER

Megan Ortman is a soprano based in Washington, DC specializing in the performance of art song, opera, and sacred music. A native of Dallas, TX, Megan has sung with venues and organizations around the world, from Alexandria to Vienna to Stratford-Upon-Avon.

In August of 2023, Megan traveled to Maine for her role debut as Marcellina in Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro with Winter Harbor Music Festival. In June, Megan sang the roles of First Spirit and Chorus in Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte at Alexandria Summer Nights Young Artists Festival in Alexandria, Virginia, which featured performances at the George Washington Masonic National Memorial and the Castleton Festival in Castleton, VA. In March of 2023, Megan was awarded an Honorable Mention from the National Society of Arts and Letters Shirley Rabb Winston Scholarship Competition, Washington DC Chapter.

Summer 2022 brought Megan to Vienna, Austria with the Vienna Summer Music Festival where she covered the role of Zerlina in Mozart’s Don Giovanni and studied the roles of Frances and The Bird Woman for the European debut of Paul Richards’ Mondo Novo. While in Vienna, Megan also sang in multiple recitals and Liederabend.

Megan graduated summa cum laude from the George Washington University in May of 2023, after studying both Music and History. Megan studied with Canadian soprano Millicent Scarlett and built a repertoire spanning from the 14th to 20th Centuries. To complete her degree, Megan performed a Capstone voice recital, Voicing Femininity, in which she presented an interconnectedness of feminine expression across 19th-century aria and art song. 

Megan has always found a home in ensembles, and she works regularly as a chorister and section leader in the greater DC area. Most recently, she was the soprano soloist at Die Vereinigte Kirche + The United Church in Foggy Bottom and a soprano chorister at Western Presbyterian Church. While at GW, she was a member and student leader of the University Singers as well as Collegium Musicum, GW’s early music choir. Megan spent her youth in the Children’s Chorus of Greater Dallas under the batons of Cynthia Nott and Norah Henson.

AN INQUISITIVE RESEARCHER

As a historian, Megan has researched music of all kinds across the Atlantic World. She sees power in centering all stories — especially ones otherwise obscured by those seeking to uphold “The Canon,” a vestige of musicology’s misogynistic, racist, and colonial formation. In her academic work, she chooses to focus her research on what wrongfully gets left out, overlooked, and forgotten. 

In 2023, Megan performed a recital titled Voicing Femininity in which she presented an interconnectedness of feminine expression across 19th-century aria and art song. By programming arias and songs with near-identical characterizations of “the speaker” back to back, she challenged the false dichotomy so often made between the two musical forms. In 2022, she was named a Wendy A. Ochsman Endowed Music Scholar by GW, a distinction awarded biannually for excellence in scholarship and performance. In 2021, she received the prestigious “Sons of the Revolution Award” from the DC chapter of The Sons of the Revolution for excellent writing on a topic of American Art and History for her research on Scott Joplin and his opera, Treemonisha. This was the first time the award was presented for work focusing on music, not visual art. 

Megan’s most recent research focuses on opera in 19th-century Italy, and more specifically, the women who occupied the role of prima donna. Megan frames this position as not only an artistic distinction but also a political one; she seeks to investigate how the position of prima donna afforded women political power they otherwise would not have had access to, and in turn, what they did with it. In her research, she came across a monograph written in 1823 by contralto Geltrude Righetti in defense of Rossini’s music, demonstrating that “prima donna power” does, in fact, have sway in the public sphere. Megan is currently translating Righetti’s writing from the original Italian in her free time.

Megan’s previous topics of research include Theodor Adorno’s commentary on jazz, the political ramifications of Early Modern American song sheets, John Gay’s The Beggar’s Opera, and the songs of Troubador women in 12th-Century Occitania.

​A DEDICATED ADMINISTRATOR

As a practitioner of multiple art forms and a participant in myriad performing arts organizations, Megan positions herself as uniquely equipped to facilitate music-making and streamline organizational administrative processes. Megan cares deeply about making music that speaks to our audiences today and ensuring those performances are accessible to as many community members as possible. In her time in performance spaces, Megan has seen how uplifting and effective administration (or, quite sincerely, the opposite) can directly impact the musician's experience, especially young musicians. As a result, she holds an ongoing goal to build collaborative artistic spaces that run well, work for the artist, and go beyond traditional hierarchies and power structures.

In September of 2023, Megan accepted the role of Manager of Programs at the Children’s Chorus of Washington in Washington, DC. In this position, she is responsible for the preparation of all rehearsal and performance programming, coordinating organizational internal communication, managing the chorister and staff calendars, maintaining the choir’s extensive music library, tracking weekly attendance, and, as a main public-facing staff member, fielding questions from all singers and their families. This was an expansion of her previous roles with CCW including Program Coordinator, Rehearsal Assistant, and Operations Intern, beginning in January of 2023. 

While at GW, Megan served two years (2020-2022) as the Vice President of the GW University Singers, GW’s premiere community-wide choral ensemble. As VP, Megan managed the choir’s social media presence, liaised between singers, faculty, and the Music Department, drafted all internal and public-facing communication, and coordinated the setup/takedown of the choir's rehearsal spaces. During her tenure with the University Singers, she grew the choir’s membership from about 20 to 105, programmed regular social events to facilitate strong community building, and made sure to know each singer’s name.