Katherine Ciesinski

Style: Opera; Classical

Title: Sanders Professor of Voice

Bio:

Mezzo-soprano Katherine Ciesinski has been exploring the world of today’s composers as well as the established classics of the lyric stage over the course of more than four decades.

Major operatic credits include three Metropolitan Opera productions, leading roles at Covent Garden, San Francisco Opera, Santa Fe, and numerous roles with the Houston Grand Opera, including the world premieres of Mark Adamo’s Little Women, Tod Machover’s Resurrection and Jake Heggie’s The End of the Affair.

Ms. Ciesinski has also performed with many of the world’s leading orchestras, including the Cleveland, Minnesota, and Philadelphia Orchestras, the Symphonies of Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, Houston and Toronto; and in Europe, with the Berlin and Vienna Philharmonics, L’Orchestre de Paris, the London Symphony Orchestra, the Dresden Staatskapelle, and L’Orchestre de la Suisse Romande.

She received a Grammy nomination for her Paulina in The Queen of Spades with the Boston Symphony (BMG) and won a Grammy for Best Opera Recording with the Houston Symphony’s live recording of Berg’s Wozzeck. Other releases include the title role of Regina by Mark Blitzstein (Decca), Aunt Cecilia in Mark Adamo’s Little Women (Ondine), Sofia Ivanova in Tod Machover’s Resurrection (Albany) and Alt Solistin in Kurt Weill’s Die Bürgschaft (EMI). She has been a judge for the Metropolitan Opera Laffont competition, among many others, and is on the international faculty of Opera Viva in Verona, Italy. She joined the faculty of the Eastman School of Music in August of 2008 and is in her 32nd year of full-time university teaching.

Voice Type: Mezzo-soprano

Music Styles Taught: Opera; Classical

Availability: I am currently accepting private students; I am available as a clinician or presenter; I accept students through a college or university program

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