Praised by the Washington Post for her dramatic intensity and vocal ability, soprano Shannon Jennings continues to wow critics and audiences alike. In the 2023-2024 season, Ms. Jennings dazzled in exciting role debuts and star billings, singing the title roles in Rusalka with Opera Orlando, Turandot with Gulfshore Opera, and Mimì in La bohème with Opera Las Vegas. Ms. Jennings performs her 5th production as Mimì with Charleston Opera Theater as part of her 2024-25 season, and she returns to the title role in Rusalka with Wichita Grand Opera.

​Ms. Jennings has been a featured soloist with Oscar-winning film composer Michael Giacchino. In 2019, she made her debut with the National Symphony Orchestra and the Philadelphia Orchestra as the soloist in the world premier of Giacchino's ADVENT, to commemorate NASA's 50th Anniversary of the Apollo 11 Lunar Landing. She can be heard as a soloist in Giacchino’s 2020 solo album, Travelogue Volume 1 with Death Waltz Originals & Mondo Records.

Recent seasons have included singing the title role in Tosca with Opera Las Vegas and Annapolis Opera, Mimì in La bohème with Kentucky Opera and Newport Classical, the title role in Pauline Viardot’s Cendrillon with Resonance Works, and Knoxville: Summer of 1915 with the Lancaster Symphony Orchestra. Equally at home on the recital stage, Ms. Jennings is an avid concert programmer. In 2023, she joined Opera Orlando in a solo recital entitled A Siren's Song in anticipation of her debut in Rusalka, and she celebrated her Cuban heritage with a program of Spanish-language songs & zarzuela, entitled La música hispana, as part of Kentucky Opera’s cultural series. She has also joined Washington Concert Opera to perform her cabaret recital, and as a soloist in their 2020 Centennial Celebration of the Suffragettes.

Ms. Jennings is an alumna of some of the country’s finest opera training programs. As a Wolf Trap Opera Filene Artist, her performances included the title role in Viardot’s Cendrillon, Beggar Woman in Sweeney Todd with the National Symphony Orchestra, Bubikopf in Der Kaiser von Atlantis, and Argentine in Gluck’s L'île de Merlin. With Palm Beach Opera, she sang Erste Dame in Die Zauberflöte alongside Matthew Polenzani and Kathryn Lewek, and covered Ana María Martínez and Latonia Moore in the company’s 2021 outdoor festival. She first covered Ms. Martínez in the role of Cio-Cio San in Madama Butterfly as a Santa Fe Opera Apprentice Artist. As a Pittsburgh Opera Resident Artist, she sang Constanza in the rarely seen Handel opera, Richard the Lionheart, for which Pittsburgh in the Round hailed Ms. Jennings as “a vision… [singing] treacherously difficult music with what seemed to be the greatest of ease and with a voice of beautiful quality and quantity."  She is also a Merola alumna, where The Bay Area Reporter wrote that "her darker sound and clear tone have a blooming quality that easily filled the big opera-house acoustic." Ms. Jennings began her career singing Pamina in Die Zauberflöte in Freiberg, Germany as a guest young artist with the Mittelsächsisches Theater.

Other highlights include Marguerite in Faust and Micaëla in Carmen with Annapolis Opera, Iseut in Frank Martin’s Le vin herbé with Washington Concert Opera & Wolf Trap Opera, Fiordiligi in Così fan tutte with Florida Opera Theatre, and Guenevere in Camelot with Virginia Opera, for which AltDaily praised her as "the perfect blend of beauty and spirit," after she appeared in the role for the detained lead in a nearly sold-out performance. ​

A formidable competitor, Ms. Jennings was a finalist in the 2019 George London Foundation competition, a winner of the 2017 Mildred Miller International Voice Competition, a Capitol District Winner in the 2016-17 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, and a winner of the 2015 Annapolis Opera Annual Vocal Competition. Originally a native of central Florida, she is a graduate of Florida State University.