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The American mezzo-soprano and music pedagogue, Ellen Williams, obtained her Bachelor of Arts degree from Meredith College, her Master of Music degree from New England Conservatory of Music, and her Doctor of Music from Florida State University.
Ellen Williams has performed extensively throughout the USA and Europe, and local appearances have been with the Winston-Salem, Greensboro and North Carolina Symphonies. Her concert repertoire includes works ranging from J.S. Bach and George Frideric Handel to Rossini and Igor Stravinsky. She has been on the North and South Carolina Touring Artist rosters with duo partner, Terry Rhodes, and together they premiered Stephen Jaffe’s Fort Juniper Songs in Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall in 1990. They have presented concerts in Italy and Germany where Williams gave a series of master-classes in Essen-Werden. Along with Rhodes, she released a CD of American vocal duet music on the Albany label in 1995, and their second, "Grand Larsen-Y", was released in 2005 by Albany of Libby Larsen’s vocal music. In June 2006 she sang the role of Berta in Rossini’s Le Barbiere di Siviglia with the Opera Company of North Carolina. In October of that year she and Rhodes presented two recitals in California, one at Cal State LA and the other at UC Santa Barbara. A CD of the Arnold Schoenberg chamber version of Gustav Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde with Williams as mezzo soloist was released January 2011 on the Centaur label.
Ellen Williams has served as Professor of Music and Coordinator of Vocal Studies in Meredith College since 1992. She formed Capital Opera with colleague, Joel Adams, in 2003, and in 2010 served on a committee that merged Capital Opera with the Opera Company of North Carolina. She now is on the Board of Directors for the North Carolina Opera. |
