Artist description Soprano Rebekkah Hilgraves has been gaining widening popularity as a 'gorgeous soprano who can act', performing in Seattle, San Francisco and other locations. She recently performed Samuel Barber's "Knoxville: Summer of 1915" with the Seattle Philharmonic Orchestra (http://www.seattlephil.com) -- her third appearance with them -- and has also been a soloist with Orchestra Seattle/Seattle Chamber Singers (http://www.osscs.org) and the Northwest Mahler Festival (http://www.nwmahlerfestival.org/mahler/). Hailed as an intelligent and engaging performer of American and French music, she is currently recording works of Samuel Barber and French composer Charles Bordes. In addition, she is an opera singer and award-winning actress (San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics' Circle: "Best Actress in a Musical", 1995).

Music Style Vocal -- opera and art song

Musical Influences Puccini, Verdi, Brahms, Schubert, Debussy, Mozart, Beethoven, Mahler, Wagner

Similar Artists Often compared to Callas and Rysanek

Artist History Rebekkah Hilgraves was born in Washington, D.C. and has traveled extensively through the United States; she currently resides in New York City. She has been training seriously for a vocal career from an early age. Studies in Voice Performance at Northern Illinois University included art song and opera, as well as early music performance practice and vocal pedagogy. Since completing her degree, Ms. Hilgraves has performed in many solo recitals in Illinois, North Carolina, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Seattle. As a member of the San Francisco Chamber Singers, she participated in a recording of Uses of Music in Uttermost Places, a work by San Francisco-based composer Elinor Armer (a Koch International CD). She has been named "Best Actress in a Musical" by the San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics’ Circle for the leading role in an original work with the Lamplighters, itself an award-winning light opera company in San Francisco. She has also taken roles in several operas and light operas, including in L’Étoile by Chabrier (Princess Laoula) with Pocket Opera; the title role in Princess Ida by Gilbert and Sullivan (again with the Lamplighters); the Second Prioress (Madame Lidoine) in Poulenc’s Dialogues des Carmelites; Helen in Three Sisters Who Are Not Sisters by Ned Rorem; she has performed in numerous other smaller roles as well. Ms. Hilgraves' current solo repertoire covers a broad range of languages and styles, and includes such works as Samuel Barber’s Hermit Songs and Knoxville: Summer of 1915; Trois Chansons de Bilitis and other songs by Debussy, Four Fragments from the Canterbury Tales by Lester Trimble, Bachianas Brasileiras #5 by Villa-Lobos as well as many songs by Schubert, Wolf, Brahms, Rorem, Poulenc and others. Operatic repertoire, in addition to the roles she has performed, includes arias by Mozart, Puccini, Wagner, Délibes, Verdi, Gershwin and many others. She is also preparing the mélodies by French composer Charles Bordes (1863-1909) for recording, after having given many of them what are almost certainly their American premieres. During the 1998-99 season, Ms. Hilgraves was the soprano soloist for the Orchestra Seattle performance of Dvorák’s Stabat Mater, led by George Shangrow. She also made two solo appearances with the Seattle Philharmonic Orchestra, directed by Marsha Mabrey. She has performed the soprano solos in the Requiems of Brahms and Mozart this season; she recently appeared again as a soloist with Orchestra Seattle/Seattle Chamber Singers in R. Vaughan Williams' "Serenade to Music", and with the Seattle Philharmonic in February of 2000, performing Samuel Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915. Critics have said of Ms. Hilgraves "…a gorgeous soprano who can act." "…this vivacious soprano…" and "...ample and ringing. Lovely! … in your ecstatic transports the grasp of the scholar is transmuted into the lyric flair--the richly nuanced aperçus--of the artist.." Ms. Hilgraves continues to appear in recitals and as soloist with orchestras in the Seattle area and elsewhere.

Group Members Rebekkah Hilgraves, soprano; Violetta Decyatnik, piano

Instruments voice

Albums "Extase" and "The French Connection", both available here!

Press Reviews A Silver Cord -- If you care for music and get around town, you may find your peregrinations startlingly linked by a silver cord of pure, soaring radiance. At Miriani’s Restaurant (2208 N 45th St, near the Guild 45th), or Leo Melina Ristorante di Mare (96 Union St, downtown), the sapient sibyl crooning the pitfalls of precarious love into a collective bittersweet may seem familiar, if hard to place—perhaps at the Camlann Medieval Fair, as the standout among The Sisters, spiriting up some rowdy ... (more at http://www.hilgraves.com/rebekkah/_reviews/a_silver_cord.htm)

Additional Info soprano

Location New York, NY - USA

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