Virginia Hesse

Soprano

 

Praised for her agile sound and lively stage presence, lyric coloratura soprano Virginia Hesse is impressing audiences with her dynamic and fiery singing. Virginia was the 2018 winner of the Canto Voice Competition with Opera Cultura in San Jose California. She recently debuted the role of Mabel in Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Pirates of Penzance with Opera Ithaca and joined the Natchez Festival of Music to perform the role of Frederika Armfeldt and cover Anne Egerman in A Little Night Music in May

2018.  She then spent the summer with Charlottesville Opera. Virginia returned to Charlottesville Opera this summer to debut in Camelot as Nimue and to cover Micaela in La Tragedie de Carmen. She will be returning to Oratorio Society of Richmond to debut the title role of Handel’s Susanna in March. Virginia is delighted to be performing the Soprano solo in the Mozart Requiem in D this Easter with the River Oaks Chamber Orchestra. She will also debut the role of Desdee in an operatic recording of the new work, K- Town. 

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Virginia made Lonestar Lyric and Operativo Houston debuts in the summer of 2017, performing as Luigia in Donizetti’s Viva La Mamma and as Elvira in L’Italiana in Algieri respectively. Other notable stage credits include Carolina in Il Matrimonio Segreto, Mary Warren in The Crucible, and Kitty Scherbatsky in David Carlson’s Anna Karenina with Moores Opera Center. Additionally, she has appeared as Adina in L’elisir d’amore and Little Red Riding Hood in Into the Woods with the Seagle Music Colony, Zerlina in Don Giovanni with American Singers Opera Project, and Adele in Die Fledermaus with the University of Louisiana Opera Theatre. She was recently a finalist of the Carolyn Bailey and Dominick Argento Vocal Competition with the National Opera Association in New Orleans and a finalist Grand Concours Competition in Austin, Texas. Virginia also competed in the 2017 Edward M. Murray Competition of Voice in Ithaca, New York and was an award winner. In 2016, Virginia was the winner of the Bill and Mary Morton award in the Kristin Lewis Competition. Virginia was also the winner of the Opera Cultura Canto Competition in 2018 and performed an artist recital in San Jose, California with compositions by renowned Latino composer Hector Armienta. 

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Ms. Hesse has performed as a soloist with various ensembles including the Lafayette Concert Band, Acadiana Symphony Orchestra, The American Institute of Musical Studies Orchestra in Graz, Austria, University of Louisiana Symphony Orchestra and the Houston Lutheran Choir where she performed the soprano solo in the Charpentier Messe de Minuit pour Noel.