Voice for the Musical Theater Stage
Directors and FacultyHarolyn BlackwellWorkshop Director Harolyn Blackwell was born in Washington D.C. She attended Catholic University where she studied voice. Following college, Blackwell began her career on Broadway when Leonard Bernstein hand picked her for the role of Maria in the 1980 revival of West Side Story. In 1983, Blackwell won the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, and her career path reoriented towards opera. "It fit so naturally," she explains of the then new foray into opera, "it was as if I'd put on a pair of old shoes." Following her win, Blackwell apprenticed and excelled at the Chicago Lyric Opera for a year. In 1987 she made her Metropolitan Opera debut as Poussette in Manon. Since then Blackwell's career has flourished. She has appeared several more times with the Metropolitan Opera in productions such as Un ballo in maschera, Le nozze di Figaro, Die Fledermaus, and Werther. Most notably, in 1994 Blackwell replaced Kathleen Battle as Marie in La fille du regiment for the entire run when Battle was fired from the Met.
Blackwell has performed with many major national and international opera companies, and at festivals around the world, including Lyric Opera of Chicago, Glyndebourne (as Clara in Porgy and Bess, subsequently issued on CD), Teatro Colon de Buenos Aires, Seattle Opera, Opera de Nice, Miami Opera, Canadian Opera Company, Aix-en-Provence Festival, Opera Orchestra of New York, New York's Mostly Mozart Festival, Tulsa Opera, San Francisco Opera, and Netherlands Opera. In 1990 Blackwell performed at the Grammy Awards. In 1997 Blackwell returned to Broadway to star as Cunegonde in Bernstein's Candide. In 1999 Blackwell was invited to perform at the Vatican for Pope John Paul II's 80th birthday. To date these are some of the roles Blackwell has performed on the stages of major Opera houses: Lucia from Lucia di Lammermoor, Lakme from Lakme, Gilda from Rigoletto, Nanetta from Falstaff, Zdenka from Arabella, Constance from Les Dialogues des Carmelites, Marzelline from Fidelio, Blondchen from Die Entfuhrung aus dem Serail, Giulietta from I Capuleti e i Montecchi, and Clara from Porgy and Bess. Also an accomplished singer of the concert repertoire and recitalist, she has performed with the Pittsburgh Symphony, the Cincinnati Symphony, the Dallas Symphony, the New York Philharmonic, the Munich Philharmonic, the Oslo Philharmonic, the New Jersey Symphony, the NHK Symphony Orchestra, the Boston Pops and the London Symphony Orchestra. Her concert work has included performances of Samuel Barber's Knoxville: Summer of 1915, Haydn's Die Schopfung, Andre Previn's Honey and Rue, Mahler's Symphony No.4, Mozart's Requiem, and Orff's Carmina Burana among many others. Blackwell has also performed in many acclaimed concert series and given many lauded recitals over the years. She has performed at London's Wigmore Hall, Carnegie Hall's Weill Recital Hall, The San Francisco Performance Series at the Herbst Theatre and the Ambassador Foundation Performing Arts Series in Los Angeles.
Location Information
Experience an exciting summer in Washington, D.C. with US Performing Arts, as we celebrate our fifth year in the nation's capital. Located in the District's historic neighborhood of Foggy Bottom, students will reside on the campus of George Washington University. With its ideal northwest locale, George Washington University is within easy visiting of all the historic sites in our nation's capital and steps away from the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. These are fantastic programs to coincide with a family vacation to Washington, D.C.
Recommended Reading Musical Theatre Anthology for Teens - Young Women's
These bestselling songbooks for teen singers, featuring more than 35 beloved Broadway songs per volume, were released in 2001. Now these valuable teaching resources are available with accompanying CDs featuring professional piano accompaniments!
These bestselling songbooks for teen singers, featuring more than 35 beloved Broadway songs per volume, were released in 2001. Now these valuable teaching resources are available with accompanying CDs featuring professional piano accompaniments! ** USPA highly recommends that students secure travel insurance to cover trip cancellation, interruption, and/or medical emergency. For more on travel insurance, please visit: Assurance Solutions.
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