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The American soprano and teacher, Carol Webber, earned her Bachelor of Music from the Oberlin Conservatory.
Carol Webber's versatile 25 year performance career defined her as a singer's singer. Her operatic roles began with the soubrette and lyric coloratura roles of Mozart, Donizetti, and Rossini, and grew to include her signature lyric soprano roles: Mimi, Micaela, Liu, and Marie in Wozzeck. She was contracted by dozens of regional opera companies and major houses including Seattle, San Francisco, Portland, Vancouver, Houston, Miami, Metropolitan Opera in New York and numerous regional opera companies.
Carol Webber was a frequent orchestral soloist in the repertoire of J.S. Bach, Mozart, Johannes Brahms, Gustav Mahler, Francis Poulenc, and Dmitri Shostakovich, singing with the major symphonies throughout the USA and Canada. She was soloist with the Houston Symphony Orchestra, Miami Symphony, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Seattle Symphony Orchestra, Oregon Symphony, and Oakland Symphony, among others. These performances led to invitations to perform vocal chamber music with the Chicago Symphony Chamber Players (the Bloch Songs of D. Shostakovich, Shepherd on the Rock of Schubert, etc.) the San Francisco Symphony Chamber Orchestra (John Harbison’s Mirabei Songs, Mozart's Exultate Jubilate) and the Boston Symphony Chamber Players (Igor Stravinsky’s Flower Songs, Delages’ Hindu Poems, Falla’s Psyché) with whom she sang the inaugural concert of Tanglewood's Seji Ozawa Hall. She opened the 50th anniversary Tanglewood season with Boston Symphony Chamber Players. She was also a member of the prestigious Bach Aria Group for six years (1986-1991) and appears on recording with them.
As a recitalist, Carol Webber's concerts were frequent in New York City's Merkin Hall ("Music Today" series), Alice Tully Hall, and the 92nd street Y. She toured the United States in repertoire of all styles and five languages; a particular specialty in new music partnered her with composers such as Steven Albert, George Perle, Johnathan Harvey, and Benton Hess, premiering many of their works in recital and chamber music concerts.
Carol Webber has been regularly invited to cities in advance of symphonic or opera engagements for residencies that included outreach programming for schools and arts organizations, and master-classes with singers in each urban center. She is former artist-in-residence at University of Washington and State University of New York (SUNY) at Stony Brook. She has given master-classes in Munich, Boston, Nova Scotia, Seattle, San Francisco, Atlanta, North Carolina, the Mannes School, and on WQXR radio in New York City. She was opening master-class presenter at the International Vocal Congress in Vancouver, B.C. She is also adjudicator in various vocal competitions. She was faculty member at Oberlin Conservatory from 1986 to 1991, and since 1991 (or 1992) she serves as Professor of Voices at the Eastman School of Music.
She has recordings on Musical Heritage Society label. |
