Welcome!
Mary Bonhag, is a young soprano devoted to the communicative and transformative powers of music. Mary most recently won the Bard College concerto competition and will sing Sibelius' tone poem "Luonnotar" with the American Symphony Orchestra next season. In 2007 she also won the University of Michigan Concerto Competition.
She has worked closely with numerous composers to premier new works, frequently with Michigan-based composer Curtis Curtis-Smith. Last May she made her Carnegie Hall solo debut singing in David T. Little’s new chamber opera Dog Days. In 2007, she created the role of “Eve” for the Pine Mountain Music Festival premiere of The Diaries of Adam and Eve, a new chamber opera by Evan Premo.
Mary has a deep-rooted love of chamber and recital repertoire, and has performed as part of the Fontana Chamber Arts Festival of Kalamazoo, MI, the Maui Classical Music Festival, Strings in the Mountains, Cactus Pear Music Festival, the Lancaster Music Festival, and SongFest as a full-scholarship Stern Fellow. She has also been featured on the NPR show Performance Today.
Maryis co-founder of “Duo Borealis” with double bassist/composer Evan Premo, performing eclectic concerts of folk, classical, and original music. She is a recent graduate from the University of Michigan and is currently based in Red Hook, New York, where she is in her last semester of her Master's degree at Dawn Upshaw's new vocal graduate program at Bard College. She studies with Edith Bers.
Mary cast in Ravel's L'enfant et les Sortileges at Bard College
On February 26 and 28, 2010, the Bard College Graduate Vocal Arts program will present an evening of three short operas, one of which is Ravel's L'enfant et les Sortilges. Mary has been chosen to sing the roles of le Feu, la Princesse, and le Rossignol, and this performance will take place at the innovative and striking Frank Gehry-designed Fisher Center at Bard College.
Mary to participate in Yellow Barn Kafka Residency!
Mary was recently chosen as one of four sopranos to study and perform Gyorgy Kurtag's great chamber piece "Kafka Fragment" for soprano and violin at Yellow Barn Music School and Festival. She will spend a week in Putney, VT working with Susan Narucki, soprano, Violaine Melancon, violin, and Kafka scholar Stanley Corngold. There will be two performances: March 13 in Brattleboro and March 14 in Boston at Logan Hall. Visit: http://www.yellowbarn.org/kafka-residency for more information.
