Emma Matthews

Soprano

Soprano Emma Matthews is a Principal Artist with Opera Australia, for which she made her debut as Damigella in Monteverdi's L'incoronazione di Poppea in 1993. She is now regarded as one of Australia’s most outstanding sopranos, equally at home with opera and concert repertoire.

For Opera Australia Emma has sung the title roles in Partenope, Lulu, Lakmé, The Cunning Little Vixen and Lucia di Lammermoor. Other roles for the company have included Amina in La Sonnambula, ( also for State Opera of South Australia) Gilda in Rigoletto, (also for Opera Queensland) Giulietta in Bellini’s I Capuleti e i Montecchi, Philomele in The Love of the Nightingale,(Mills) Leila in The Pearlfishers, Cleopatra in Julius Caesar, Zwaantie in Batavia, Juliette in Romeo and Juliette, the four heroines in The Tales of Hoffmann, Rosina in The Barber of Seville, Konstanze and Blonde in The Abduction from the Seraglio, Papagena and Pamina in The Magic Flute, Marie in La Fille du Regiment, Oscar in Un Ballo in Maschera and Sophie in Der Rosenkavalier and Almirena in Rinaldo.

Emma is equally in demand on the concert platform, embracing a wide repertoire including the Requiems of Mozart, Fauré and Brahms, Poulenc, Villa Lobos, Haydn Masses and Handel’s Messiah. Her Festival engagements include Philomele in The Love of the Nightingale in Perth, Ismene in Mitridate, in Sydney, and appearances in Melbourne, Adelaide and Huntington Festivals. More recently Emma appeared as a special guest with José Carreras in his Sydney concerts, the New Year’s Eve Gala for Opera Australia and in Mozart’s Mass in C minor with Sir Charles Mackerras and the Sydney Symphony.

Further career highlights include her Covent Garden debut in the title role of The Cunning Little Vixen, Mahler’s Symphony no. 4 with Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte Carlo and conductor Yakov Kreizberg and with the Sydney Symphony and Vladimir Ashkenazy, Mahler Symphony No. 2 with SSO and Ashkenazy, and her solo album of bel canto arias, Emma Matthews in Monte Carlo released by Universal / ABC Classics to much acclaim.