With the new year comes new talent to the COC, including American mezzo-soprano Jennifer Holloway's company debut! Jennifer is known across the globe for her “nuanced dramatic impulses” and a “voice that is liquid, lambent, and lit from within.”

What she’s doing with us: Jennifer will be making her company debut as woman scorned Elvira in our upcoming production of Don Giovanni.

Where you might have seen her: Jennifer's recent performances have met with wide critical acclaim, including her English National Opera debut as Prince Orlofsky in Christopher Alden’s striking production of Die Fledermaus (a co-production with the Canadian Opera Company); her breakthrough performance at Argentina’s Teatro Colón as Temple Drake in the world premiere of Oscar Strasnoy’s new opera, Requiem; and her return to the Metropolitan Opera for Tebaldo in Don Carlo, conducted by the late Lorin Maazel. Jennifer has previously sung the role of Donna Elvira for both Pittsburgh Opera (2012) and Tulsa Opera (2011).

Jennifer Holloway as Irene in Teatro Real's Tamerlano, 2008 [first seen riding the elephant at 59:00]

 

Jennifer also has a wide variety of concert work under her belt, with highlights including her first appearances with the Marseille Philharmonic and Maestro Lawrence Foster in a concert tour of China, and with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra in a program including the world premiere of Frédéric Chaslin’s Love and a Question, a series of songs based on poetry by Robert Frost, which Chaslin composed for her.

Jennifer Holloway singing Frédéric Chaslin’s Love and a Question

 

Acclaim for Jennifer Holloway as Donna Elvira in Mozart's Don Giovanni:

“Jennifer Holloway as Donna Elvira was the most impressive of the women, singing with fine line, intensity and ample intelligence.”
–Mark Kanny, Pittsburgh Tribune Review, 2012

“Ms. Holloway had... an expressiveness that came to the fore in "Mi tradi," in which Elvira lays bare her conflicted soul.”
–Andrew Druckenbrod, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 2012

"Holloway's [mezzo] soprano captures the high-strung intensity of Donna Elvira, a woman driven mad–in every sense of the word–by love for the wrong sort of man. Holloway almost spits out "Ah! chi mi dice mai" with a bitter vengefulness, only later to wrestle with inexplicable yet inescapable feelings of love in "Mi tradi quell' alma."
–James D. Watts Jr., Tulsa World, 2011

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Photo Credit (top image): Jennifer Holloway. Photo: Arielle Doneson, 2014.

Find out the latest news on Jennifer by following her on Twitter @jennhollowaaay

Catch Jennifer Holloway in the COC's production of Don Giovanni, opening in January 2015. For more information and to buy tickets, visit here.