Wallis Giunta, mezzo soprano

If you're interested in the life of an opera singer on the road, you have come to the right place...

Canadian mezzo, Wallis Giunta, has been praised by OPERA NEWS for her “delectably rich, silver-toned mezzo-soprano, with a beautiful sense of line and effortless, rapid runs”, with her recent performance as Mozart’s Sesto for the Canadian Opera Company (COC) celebrated as “a triumph…remarkable in its combination of intelligence and beauty”. In the 2014/15 season she returns to the Metropolitan Opera as Olga in a new production of The Merry Widow, to Opera Lyra Ottawa as Cherubino in Le Nozze di Figaro, and to Opera Atelier (Toronto) as Bradamante in a new period-production of Alcina. Wallis also makes her debut with Madison Opera in their Opera in the Parks gala concert, and performs programs of Mendelssohn and Beethoven with the National Arts Centre Orchestra (Canada). Future seasons see her German debut at Oper Leipzig (La Cenerentola, Le Nozze di Figaro, Faust, Die Walkure), her debut at Oper Frankfurt (Carmen), and her Italian debut at Teatro dell’Opera di Roma.

Wallis began the 2013/14 season as Annio in La Clemenza di Tito for her debut with the Taipei Symphony Orchestra, followed by Countess Ceprano in Rigoletto at the Met, and Dorabella in Atom Egoyan’s new production of Cosí fan tutte at the Canadian Opera Company. In June 2014, she recorded her first album with the RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra in Dublin (NAXOS), of a new work by American composer, William Perry . Wallis also debuted with the Toronto and Saskatoon Symphony Orchestras, and with the 21C Music Festival, premiering Louis Andriessen’s one-woman-opera, Anaïs Nin. She performed concerts and recitals in Toronto, New York, and Regina, and brought her acclaimed program of Kurt Weill’s The Seven Deadly Sins to Miami, New York, Toronto and Ottawa.

She had a whirlwind 2012/13 season, making her Metropolitan Opera debut in Rigoletto, debuting the role of Annio in La Clemenza di Tito with the Canadian Opera Company, making her Paris debut with Le Théâtre du Châtelet as Tiffany in John Adams’s rare opera I Was Looking at the Ceiling and Then I Saw the Sky, and singing Dorabella in the Met + Juilliard production of Cosí fan tutte, to rave reviews. She also made debuts with Fort Worth Opera, L’Opéra de Montréal, the Edmonton, Seville and Nuremberg Symphonies, the Stuttgart Festivalorchester, and the National Arts Centre and Munich Radio Orchestras.

Wallis is a passionate recitalist, and has recently performed for the Aspen, Caramoor, Banff, Luminato, Music & Beyond, and Ottawa Chamber Music festivals. She has studied at the Glenn Gould School, COC Ensemble Studio, the Ravinia Festival's Steans Music Institute, and the International Meistersinger Akademie. Wallis is a grateful recipient of the Novick Career Advancement Grant, the Sylva Gelber Music Foundation Career Development Award, and multiple grants from the Canada Council for the Arts. She is a 2013 graduate of both the Metropolitan Opera Lindemann Young Artist Development Program, and The Juilliard School’s Artist Diploma in Opera Studies.

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