About

My name is Andrea. I'm a classically trained opera singer, a writer, and a North Carolina native.

I perform at home and abroad in traditional opera and recitals (like with the Vancouver International Song Institute, North Carolina Opera, & NC's Heafner-Williams Vocal Competition) and innovative contemporary works, multimedia programs, and weird collaborations (like at the American Ambassador's Residence in Warsaw, Poland, and the Society of Composers, Inc. National Conference).

I want to live in a city full of talented, creative musical collaborators--people who are ready to grab their old-school chops & training and craziest avant-garde performance imaginings and come out to play. Somewhere there's an audience for our music--people who are excited to come hear us in a concert hall, at a bar on a Sunday afternoon, or maybe either one. (Oh and we obvs get paid.) We might travel for work sometimes, but there's enough music right there in town to take up a nice fat chunk of anyone's professional calendar. We're not all locals, but there's room in the classical music scene for people who started there and not just those who've proven themselves in other markets.

But I also want nice weather and a low cost of living. And I want to collaborate with other musicians, not (mostly) compete with them. And even if any of these factors were negotiable for me, I still wouldn't want to move to New York. Even if they were negotiable for me, New York's not the place I'm looking for. Pretty sure the place I'm looking for doesn't exist.

I do happen to live on the outskirts of Raleigh, NC, the fastest-growing city in the US, projected to compete with other more storied metropolitan areas starting any day now. We have the warm weather, the cheap rents, and the Southern civility, but Raleigh & environs are also full of spunky startups of every kind, bomb-ass food, music, & culture, and person-on-a-missions growing and enriching the community in a million different ways.

The Triangle (Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill) is home to a few different musical institutions that meet the highest standards of quality, but are doing things a little differently. Also to plenty of wonderful musicians of all types, and to an open-minded populace that's actively looking for new cultural experiences.

For a long time I was trying to figure out where I could move to find the world I'm imagining, but now I think I'll stay put and try to help build it instead. I think Raleigh can become the site of a new kind of musical community, where classical music finds more innovation, more different types of expression, and more engagement from the mainstream community than anywhere else.

Am I right? No clue--only time will tell. But read along and let's find out together :)