mezzo soprano

Alice Chung, mezzo-soprano

American mezzo-soprano Alice Chung is rapidly being recognized for her "operatic tonal glamour (parterre box) and being “a force of nature with a sound both powerful and appealing” (San Francisco Classical Voice).

Ms. Chung’s 2023-2024 season commenced with a celebrated house début at Boston Lyric Opera as Suzuki in Madama Butterfly, after which Opera News declared Ms. Chung “one of America’s most gifted young singers.” Other notable appearances included a return to Hawai’i Opera Theatre in An American Dream and a début with Houston Grand Opera in the world premiere of The Big Swim. She also joined Boston Modern Orchestra Project for Bernstein’s Symphony No. 1 and Out of the Box Opera to sing the Principessa in Suor Angelica. On the concert stage, Ms. Chung enjoyed a return engagement with the U.S. Naval Academy in Handel’s Messiah, accompanied by the Annapolis Symphony Orchestra. This season, Ms. Chung sings Amneris in Aida with Boston Lyric Opera, the title role in Carmen with Hawaii Opera Theatre, and she reprises her roles of the Ox and the Pig in The Big Swim, this time with Asia Society Texas in Houston.

Previous engagements included a house and role début at Hawai’i Opera Theatre as Suzuki in Madama Butterfly, covering the role of Granny Jia in Dream of the Red Chamber in San Francisco Opera’s coproduction with the Hong Kong Arts Festival, along with a return to cover the role of Suzuki, and house débuts with Arizona Opera as the Third Lady in Die Zauberflöte and La mort in Le rossignol with West Edge Opera.

A graduate of the Academy of Vocal Arts, Ms. Chung has also performed with Tulsa Opera, Central City Opera, Chautauqua Opera, and the Lyric Opera of Kansas City. Role credits include La Zia Principessa in Suor Angelica, Zita in Gianni Schicchi, Maddalena in Rigoletto, Ježibaba in Rusalka, Die Hexe in Hänsel und Gretel, Mrs. Grose in The Turn of the Screw, Larina in Eugene Onegin, and Mariana in Luisa Fernanda. On the concert stage, she has sung with the Kansas City Symphony, Bucks County Symphony, and the Naples Philharmonic at Artis-Naples. Concert credits include Duruflé’s Requiem, Saint-Saëns’s Oratorio de Noël, Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky, and Beethoven’s Fantasia and Mass in C Major.

As a two-time alum of the prestigious Merola Opera Program, Ms. Chung garnered acclaim from San Francisco audiences for her excerpted portrayals of Santuzza in Cavalleria Rusticana, Augusta Tabor in The Ballad of Baby Doe, and Azucena in Il trovatore, which parterre box praised for its “riveting dramatic intensity.” The San Francisco Chronicle lauded Ms. Chung’s Gertrude in Hamlet as “ringing, magisterial.” She returned for her Schwabacher Recital début, presented by the Merola Opera Program in conjunction with San Francisco Opera and has continued to perform recitals in the Bay Area since. A lover of collaboration and chamber music, Ms. Chung has premiered new works alongside standard literature.

Ms. Chung is an honored recipient of numerous grants and winner of various competitions, including the 2022 Gerda Lissner Lieder/Song Competition, the Richard F. Gold Career Grant from the Shoshana Foundation, First Prize and Audience Favorite awards at the Young Patronesses of the Opera, First Place in the Cooper-Bing Competition, District and Regional Winner in the Metropolitan Opera Laffont Competition, and the 2021 William Matheus Sullivan Foundation Audition Awards.

As the artistic director and co-founder of the arts and advocacy initiative Wear Yellow Proudly, Ms. Chung works to raise awareness of Asian and AAPI narratives and culture by showcasing and celebrating Asian art and artists worldwide.


Upcoming Performances

Kindra Scharich, mezzo-soprano

Mezzo-soprano Kindra Scharich has been praised by the San Francisco Chronicle for her “fearless technical precision,” “deep-rooted pathos” and “irrepressible musical splendor.” As a dedicated recitalist, she has performed more than 250 art songs in 15 languages, and enjoys the full complement of recital, concert and opera engagements alike.

Ms. Scharich has sung more than 40 roles from Monteverdi to Philip Glass, and has been engaged in a number of premières and new works, including: John Adam’s Antony & Cleopatra (San Francisco Opera), Bright Sheng’s Dream of the Red Chamber (San Francisco Opera), Laura Kaminsky’s Today it Rains (Opera Parallèle), and Missy Mazzoli’s Breaking the Waves (West Edge Opera, west coast première). Scharich’s recordings include: In meinem Himmel: The Mahler Song Cycles, with the Alexander String Quarter (2018), Everyone SangL Vocal Music of David Conte (2018), To my Distant Beloved, with pianist Jeffrey LaDeur (2020), Nepomuceno Overseas, with pianist Ricardo Ballestero (2021) and To the Western Sea: Remembering Ursula K. Le Guin (2021).



Upcoming Performances

Maria Dominique Lopez, mezzo soprano

Praised as “a rich-voiced mezzo” (Operawire) and “a real tour-de-force” (Splash Magazine), Mexican-American mezzo soprano Maria Dominique Lopez has sung operatic roles and symphonic works throughout the United States and Europe for over a decade. Additionally, Maria has recorded vocals for independent films and major motion pictures, including Golden Globe and Academy Award-Winning Disney/Pixar film, “Coco,” and New Line Cinema’s horror film, “The Curse of La Llorona.” Recent stage appearances include Houston Grand Opera: Opera to Go! (Madrina/Madrastra, Cinderella in Spain), Arizona Opera (Dritte Dame, Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte; Bonita, Arizona Lady), Phoenix Symphony (mezzo soloist, Vaughan Williams’ Magnificat), Resonance Works / Pittsburgh (Candelas, de Falla’s El Amor Brujo), Opera Memphis (Third Lady, Mozart’s The Magic Flute), Pacific Opera Project (Madam Flora, Menotti’s The Medium; Mercédes, Bizet’s Carmen; Musetta, Puccini’s La bohème), the world premiere at The Kennedy Center and the Polish premiere at the Teatr Muzycznys Poznaniu of Jenni Brandon’s 3 Paderewskis (Ignace), the LA premiere of Mark Weiser’s The Place Where You Started (Samantha), New Opera West (Cybil, Celka Ojakangas’ Mirror Game; Jenny, Ben Stevenson’s Recovered; Sara, Jeremy Rapaport-Stein’s The Moose), Southeast Symphony (mezzo soloist, Mahler’s Symphony No. 2), Angels Vocal Art (Principessa, Puccini’s Suor Angelica), Tustin Area Council for the Fine Arts (“Somewhere” soloist, Leonard Bernstein’s West Side Story), Long Beach Opera (mezzo soloist, Ungala Series), and LA Opera’s education outreach company, LA Opera Connects (Waitress/Angela, the world premiere of GG Gallegos’ Another Perfect Day; Rosina, Eli and LeRoy Vilanueva’s Figaro’s American Adventure). Dreams, and Cincinnati Opera (Third Wood Nymph, Dvorak’s Rusalka), but these performances were postponed to a future date due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Pandemic performances include “From Darkness to Light,” a livestream concert in which Maria joined other instrumentalists and vocalists from the Los Angeles area to benefit the SoCal Vocalist Relief Fund, and two online fundraisers for Resonance Works / Pittsburgh. In the Fall of 2020, Maria performed the world premiere of her first collaboration as a lyricist, “The COVID Dance” composed by Celka Ojakangas as part of a concert honoring the Women’s March produced by Resonance Works/Pittsburgh. Upcoming 2022 performances will see a fulfillment of the original contract to return to Resonance Works / Pittsburgh (Rosa, I Am a Dreamer Who No Longer Dreams), and as a soloist in LA Opera’s collaboration with The Huntington Library. A native Arizonan, Maria received her Bachelor of Fine Arts and Master of Music degrees from Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, Arizona. She now lives in the Los Angeles area and owns her own energy healing and reiki practice, Ascending Arts. In addition to energy healing sessions, Maria uses her healing gifts to enhance her music performance in a program called “Sing the Light.” Through “Sing the Light,” Maria offers group Reiki during every live performance to all audience members who are open to receiving. It is her mission to help audience members tap into the transcendental healing that music can offer by creating a quantum connection between the heart of the performer and the heart of the audience member. She is a Senior Fellow in the Eric Fütterer Vocal Studio of Academy of Advanced Vocal Technique, and studies shamanic and energy practices with Shaman and Reiki Master, Jamie Jones.

More on Maria Dominique Lopez at: https://www.ascendingarts.exchange/voice



Upcoming Performances