The Development of an Opera Singer

A slow cooker process in a microwave age

The development of a voice for a professional-level operatic singing career can only begin when two non-negotiable, unteachable qualities are present: a keen musical ear and a natural vocal coordination. These and many other qualities go into the making of an operatic artist including expressive skill, instinctive musical phrasing, poetic sensitivity, artistic curiosity, facility with languages, good physical condition, self-discipline, patience, the ability to benefit from criticism and to persist in spite of rejection. Each voice is unique and there are no shortcuts: the singer must be willing to consistently devote the time necessary to develop vocal facility, range, flexibility, and endurance, under careful supervision and over an extended period of time. Constance Fee will share her perspective and insights on this slow cooker process in a microwave age, based on her decades of performing and teaching experience.

Constance Fee is Director of Vocal Studies and Associate Professor of Vocal Performance at Roberts Wesleyan University in Rochester, NY. Described in OPERNWELT Berlin as “vocally brilliant, dramatically spontaneous, and thoroughly alive,” Constance Fee has performed leading roles with the Opéra National de Paris la Bastille, Opéra Comique, Opéra de Lyon, Netherlands Opera, New Israeli Opera, Welsh National Opera, Staatsoper Stuttgart, Oper der Stadt Köln, Vienna Volksoper, Houston Grand Opera, Opera Theatre of St. Louis, and Lyric Opera of Kansas City. Her repertoire of over fifty soprano and mezzo-soprano roles includes the title roles in Puccini's Tosca, Bizet's Carmen, Rossini's La Cenerentola, Donizetti’s La Favorite, and Der Rosenkavalier by Richard Strauss, as well as Brangäne in Wagner's Tristan und Isolde, Der Komponist in Ariadne auf Naxos by Strauss, and Charlotte in Massenet’s Werther.

Her students have performed with opera companies including Washington National Opera, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, Chautauqua, Glimmerglass, Sarasota, Kansas City, San Francisco Opera/Merola, Caramoor, Teatro Nuovo/Bel Canto, Aspen, Miami, Amalfi Coast, and Les Chorégies d’Orange, France, and have won Regional and District levels of the Metropolitan Opera Laffont Competition, including a National Semifinalist.

Come to this lecture for the inside story on what it takes for a singer to develop their voice!

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