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Angela Meade OPERA
MADE FOR
Wah Keung Chan
where she has appeared regularly in the school’s
productions. “It’s like an opera finishing school,
Discovering opera was the most important and I’ve learned to be comfortable on stage.” Her
thing to happen to the 2009 Montreal favourite singers include Montserrat Caballé (for
International Music Competition Grand the bel canto) and Margaret Price.
Prize and People’s Choice Award winner Angela Meade’s success has primarily come in competitions;
Meade. Although the large-voiced American soprano
Montreal represents her 24 th win. One of her
sang in elementary school, high school, and secrets is to not wear her contact lenses on stage.“I
church choirs, taking up solos all the while, opera just prefer to be in my own zone and not be accidentally
and classical music was far from her culture. “My
distracted by anybody,” said Meade, who
mom had always wanted to be a Christian music has a matter-of-fact attitude about competing. “I
singer and was even offered a contract,” said the realize that if something happens [and I make a mistake],
ever-smiling Meade. “Singing pop didn’t fit my life
nobody is going to die.” In the Metropolitan
and singing country and western didn’t fit my Opera’s HD documentary The Audition, one of the
voice.”
judges remarked that her large weight is going to stopped by during intermission to say that I looked
While attending community college, Meade’s hinder her career. Ironically, the day after winning gorgeous,” she said. Meade has been reengaged by
musicology teacher suggested voice lessons, and the 2007 Met Auditions on the strength of her the Met until 2012 for roles such as the Countess in
her first teacher assigned her Susanna’s aria from “Casta Diva”, Meade was offered the cover for the Marriage of Figaro in December 2009. Despite the
Marriage of Figaro. Meade was finally in her element,
role of Elvira in the Met’s 2008 production of Verdi’s Met’s support, she acknowledges that weight is one
and she quickly enrolled in a four-year Ernani.For the production’s third performance,inter-
of her concerns in getting hired, “I’m working to
music program, where she was given more lyric national soprano Sondra Radvanovsky cancelled change it. You don’t want to lose weight too quickly,
arias. During her master’s at the University of with one day’s notice due to illness, and Meade otherwise it would affect the voice.”
Southern California, her teacher thought she was made a triumphant debut. She flew her parents The MIMC prize comes with a recording on the
a dramatic coloratura and she began singing the from Seattle and could finally tell them that she Analekta label, which will be Meade’s first.“I consider
“Queen of the Night” and “Casta Diva” from could earn a living from singing. “I had been in myself fortunate to have found something I love to
Bellini’s Norma, this later aria being crucial to her rehearsals with the rest of the covers, so I felt prepared,”
do that I excel in and that doesn’t feel like work.” ■
success. Meade started a doctorate at USC before
explains Meade. She admitted to being a bit
leaving for Philadelphia’s Academy of Vocal Arts, nervous just before going on stage. “Peter Gelb www.angelameade.com
Yannick-MurielNOAH
Her success there led directly to a debut in La
»FOLLOWING HER HEART
Wally in Klagenfurt which was hailed “a resounding
success,” her voice “voluminous and beautifully
Joseph K. So
unfolding,” and her acting “sensitive” and
“touching” (Opernglas, Hamburg. Nov. 2008). She
MIMC Second Prize and Chalmers Award
has been re-engaged as Aïda in May 2010, but not
winner Canadian lyrico-spinto soprano
before Madama Butterfly at the COC this fall.
Yannick-Muriel Noah would have taken
With the opera world hungry for big lyricospintos,
a very different career path had she not listened to
her inner voice. The Madagascar-born Noah was
studying architecture at Carleton University, but
realized she’d rather be making music. This interest
started at a young age and she studied clarinet and
played saxophone in the school band. But most of
all, Noah loved to sing. “My first teacher told me I
had an operatic voice,” she said.
Her acceptance into the Canadian Opera
Company Ensemble Studio while finishing her
Bachelor’s was life changing. Noah remembers
with gratitude that “they took a chance on me
even though I was very green!”
From the start, hers was a voice of great
potential. I recall her COC summer concert
singing “Pace, pace mio Dio,” an audacious aria
choice. Her voice had a gleaming, rich sound:
truly one to be reckoned with.
Noah made her full-length production debut as
Clotilde in the COC’s staging of Norma. As a member
of the Ensemble, she learned and covered many
roles without actually singing them on stage. Her
big break came when she filled in for two performances
of Tosca, wowing audiences and critics alike.
Since her first season with the COC, Noah has
gone on to compete in over twenty vocal competitions.
Competitions fulfill her need to connect with
an audience, helping her hone her craft in public.
Although Noah admits to feeling nervous in front
of the judges, she quite enjoys a competitive environment
to push herself and test her mettle. In
2007, Noah placed second in the Belvedere Hans
Gabor Competition in Vienna to American Angela
Meade, who also won in Montreal.
“It was my first competition in Europe, and it
freed me, as I wasn’t scared of being judged. I
learned how open I could be onstage,” she said.
it may not surprise that Noah is being
offered these heavier roles at a young age. An
intelligent singer, Noah is aware of the dangers
of ‘too much, too soon’, but with her big, vibrant
sound, she finds Verdi, Puccini and verismo a good
fit. She is also attracted to the enigmatic
Marietta in Die tote Stadt. The upcoming COC
Butterfly will be her biggest sing: “what really hit
me when I saw the Met Butterfly was the intensity
of emotions—I’m exhausted just thinking
about it! I’ll have to learn quickly how to give, but
also keep enough to last to the end.”
Married and a mother of two daughters—10-
month-old Olwynn and 5-year-old Sierra—Noah has
the maturity to balance family life with the increasing
demands of a career. With her exceptional gifts
as a singer combined with the proper guidance and
advice of her teacher (Darryl Edwards) and coaches,
and with any luck, a future agent who has her welfare
at heart,we’ll be seeing Yannick-Muriel Noah on
opera stages for years to come. ■
www.concoursmontreal.ca
PHOTOS Gunther Gamper
14 Juillet - août 2009 July - August