mezzo-soprano

Rachel Kelly

Bajazet

Biography

Irish mezzo-soprano Rachel Kelly is a graduate of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden’s Jette Parker Young Artist Programme where she performed in productions of Il turco in Italia, I due Foscari, Manon and Carmen. She was singled out by Opera Today for her “rich sensuality of voice” and “glowing warmth” in the role of Mirinda in Kasper Holten’s L’Ormindo conducted by Christian Curnyn, and earned unanimous praise for Proserpina (Orfeo) at London’s Roundhouse.

Rachel has made a number of notable international debuts in the past few seasons including in La Calisto under Ivor Bolton at Teatro Real Madrid, Le comte Ory with both Opéra de Rennes and Opéra de Rouen Normandie, Idamante (Idomeneo) as part of the Maggio Musicale Firenze, where she also sang Nancy in Albert Herring, and Annio (La clemenza di Tito) for Staatstheater Karlsruhe. Closer to home, Kelly has been heard as Dorabella (Cosi fan tutte) with Glyndebourne on Tour, Annio at Glyndebourne Festival Opera, Donna Elvira (Don Giovanni) with Northern Ireland Opera, and Hansel (Hansel and Gretel) with English National Opera, and makes her debut at Wexford Festival in the title role of Rossini’s Adina in the current season.

In concert, she has sung Sesto (Giulio Cesare) under Christian Curnyn, Idamante (Idomeneo) under Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla, Nerone (Agrippina) under Jonathan Cohen, and Marguerite (La damnation de Faust) under Sir Mark Elder. Elsewhere, she joined Laurence Cummings at the Internationale Händel-Festspiele Göttingen in The Choice of Hercules, and the Münchner Rundfunkorchester in Rossini’s Sigismondo.

April 2020

Image credit Gerard Collett