Soprano

 

Elizabeth Atherton is one of Britain's most versatile and promising young singers performing in a wide range of repertoire in both concert and opera. She read Music at Trinity College Cambridge before entering the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama, where she studied with Patricia MacMahon. She has won several prestigious prizes including the 2001 Maggie Teyte Prize and the 2003 Handel Singing Competition. She is the recipient of the WNO Sir John Moores Award and WNO Chris Ball Bursary.

 

She is currently an Associate Artist at Welsh National Opera and has sung numerous roles for the company including Countess (Marriage of Figaro), Elivra (Don Giovanni), Pamina (Die Zauberflöte), Minerva (Il Ritorno d'Ulisse in Patria) and Thibault (Don Carlos).

Other operatic appearances include Conception (L'Heure Espagnole), the title role in Alcina, Female Chorus (The Rape of Lucretia) and Ilia (Idomeneo). She has also sung Melissa (Amadigi) and La Stonatrilla (Gassmann L'Opera Seria) for the Batignano Festival Italy, and Helena (A Midsummer Night's Dream) with English Touring Opera.

 

She is equally well known as a concert artist and has performed Tippett's The Vision of St. Augustine with BBC National Orchestra of Wales and Richard Hickox at the BBC Proms, Mahler and Strauss Lieder with BBC Symphony and Jiri Belohlavek, Verdi Four Sacred Pieces with London Symphony and Antonio Pappano, Debussy Trois Ballades de Francois Villon and Boulez Le Soleil des Eaux with Pierre Boulez and BBC Symphony at the Barbican, Handel arias at the London Handel Festival, Mozart Coronation Mass with BBC Scottish Symphony at the St. Magnus Festival, Elgar The Spirit of England with Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, Bach B Minor Mass with Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, Messiah with Northern Sinfonia and Matthew Best, Vivaldi Gloria and Bach Magnificat with Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Haydn Creation with English Festival Orchestra and Sir David Willcocks and Berlioz Les Nuits d'Eté with the English Chamber Orhcestra and Benjamin Wallfisch.

 

In recital, she has appeared with Iain Burnside for the BBC Radio 3 Voices series, at Wigmore Hall and Leeds Lieder+ Festival. She has also given recitals at the Purcell Room, St. David's Hall Cardiff, National Portrait Gallery and Linbury Studio at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden. She has appeared on In Tune for BBC Radio 3 and recorded Liszt's Via Crucis and Missa Choralis with Matthew Best and the Corydon Singers (Hyperion), the solos on a disc of English Choral Favourites with the City of Birmingham Symphony Chorus (EMI) and her first recital disc, Classic Children's Songs, with Roderick Williams and Iain Burnside (Just Accord).

 

Recent and future plans include Micaela (Carmen) for Welsh National Opera, Helena (Midsummer Nights Dream) for Opera North and Pamina (The Magic Flute) for Grange Park. She also gives concerts with the Philharmonia and Sir Charles Mackerras (Beethoven Symphony No. 9), Messiah with the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano Giuseppe Verdi with Sir Neville Mariner, Berg Seven Early Songs at St. David's Hall, Mahler Symphony No. 2 at the Royal Albert Hall and Handel Solomon at the London Handel Festival and in Oslo.