I am a recent graduate of The Royal College of Music in which I studied as a mezzo-soprano and was awarded a II:1. I am currently taking a year out as I did not do so before my Undergraduate degree and am now applying for a Masters in Performance. My journey as a singer began at a young age and it has taken hard work, patience and determination with the aim to bring the ‘story’ within me to the fore; as Maya Angelou states: “There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you”.
At RCM I was part of the Chorus and Chamber Choir, following my participation at the Senior and Chamber Choir from Year 9 at school, with performances that include Evensong at Durham Cathedral and Edinburgh Fringe. These ensembles taught me basic sight-reading and ensemble singing. Over the years, I have attended summer schools at RAM, NYMT, NYT (which I am a member till the age of 25) and Oundle Festival of Music and Drama in which I participated in for two years in a row gaining the Young Singer of the Year Prize in 2015. I also enrolled in Music Fest at Aberystwyth in 2018 and 2019. I also took part in an opera performing workshop in Cesena, Italy, which also helped me perfect my Italian.
My Catalan background made me appreciate diversity of languages and cultures, with my introduction to Catalan, Spanish, Italian and French. This has enriched me personally, as well as being beneficial for my singing besides giving me cultural awareness. This allows the singer to communicate emotionally with the audience.
My experience in performance stems from my love of drama when I began to take part in amateur dramatic performances, such as the school productions of The Pirates of Penzance as Ruth, the Witch in Into the Woods, Reverend Paris in The Crucible, Mary Magdalene in Jesus Christ Superstar and First Witch in Macbeth.
The recent pandemic has given us challenges that we never expected but, it has strengthened my personal traits, such as my ability to handle stress, organisation, self discipline and patience. I had my classes online, including opera coaching working on Messagiera from Handel’s L’Orfeo. My knowledge of technology helped me find inventive and inspiring ways to make music whilst learning from my fellow students during the process of recording myself on video camera whilst simultaneously audio recording on Ableton which I then synced up for the whole group. Whilst in lockdown I collaborated with other musicians: students with whom I was preparing final performances. For instance, with a lutenist in his recital and also collaborated with a cellist for my own 3rd year recital. Preparing for this was challenging due to my pianist who cancelled at short notice, therefore I had a short time to prepare with my new pianist. However, I rose to the challenge and was awarded a First!
In recent months I have had been given the opportunity to perform as a Fairy in A Midsummer Night’s Dream for the Grange Festival. This was my operatic debut and what a way to start, with an incredible director, Paul Curran, and working alongside seasoned professionals. It is an experience that I will never forget as I learnt many skills such as, thinking on my feet, projecting for an auditorium but also blending with the rest of the chorus. Also, at short notice I had to step in as the role of the Changeling Boy for on performance as well as doing my duties as a fairy. Although this was a silent role, it was still very challenging physically and I believe that I delivered considering what little time I had to prepare.
After interning at a female-led radio station Foundation FM (helping with editing, producing and presenting), I have developed my own podcast show called, Face the Music, where I bring on fellow musicians and discuss about certain topics. For example, I brought on a group called Bassists with Boobs, a platform to promote female double bassists or those that identify as female and we discussed normalisation of the fact that the double can be an instrument for all walks of life.
I am a keen learner, I work hard at everything I love and feel that, after nearly four years at conservatoire, my journey has only just begun and a professional singing career is exactly what I want.