Sarah Richmond
Winner of the 2021 Toronto Mozart Vocal Competition, 2022 New York NYIOP ANON Competition and finalist in the 2022 Montserrat Caballé Competition in Teatro Real, Mezzo Soprano Sarah Richmond is known for emotional engagement, with Opera Now reviewing “her consistently supple and finely shaped coloratura portrayed the kaleidoscope of feelings endured by her character. Brava.” Opera Magazine remarking “her acting wholly convincing”, Online Musik Magazin praising her “kraftiges Timbre und grosse Strahlkraft” (strong timbre and great radiance), Irish Times “star of the show” and Classical Source “searing virtuosity”.
Operatic performances include Willie Guglielmo Ratcliff, Yelena Popova The Bear, Meg Falstaff, Véronique Le docteur Miracle, (Wexford Festival Opera), Komponist Ariadne auf Naxos (Mousaverse), Zweite Dame Die Zauberflöte, cover Rosina Il barbiere di Siviglia (Irish National Opera), Rosina Il barbiere di Siviglia (Ulster Touring Opera), Terza Damigella La Liberazione di Ruggiero (Longborough Festival Opera), La Zia Principessa Suor Angelica (Random Opera), Hansel Hansel and Gretel, Suzuki Madama Butterfly (Lyric Opera), Idamante Idomeneo (Brunswick Vocal Arts), Bianca/Gabriella La Rondine, Third Witch Macbeth (Iford Arts), Mrs Kneebone A Dinner Engagement (Cameratina), Kate Owen Wingrave (Opera Collective Ireland), Mercédès Carmen, Valencienne The Merry Widow (North West Opera), Dritte Dame Die Zauberflöte (Pavilion Opera), Cherubino Le nozze di Figaro, Dritte Dame Die Zauberflöte (Opera in the Open), Second Lady The Magic Flute (Northern Ireland Opera), Phoebe The Yeomen of the Guard (Scratch Opera), Dido Dido and Aeneas (Queen’s University of Belfast), Sorceress Dido and Aeneas (Wetherby Choral Society), Flora abridged La Traviata (Castleward Opera), and Erika Vanessa, Nancy Albert Herring , Gossip Noye’s Fludde, cover Daniel Belshazzar (RNCM).
An advocate of contemporary music, Sarah has given world premieres Lucrece What Happened to Lucrece (Wexford Festival Opera), Conscience Rupture (Irish National Opera), Iris The Heavenly Ledger (Random Opera), Mezzo The Swan and The Crane (Foyle O-Bon Festival), Mezzo May Magnificat (Bollington Choral Society), Helen The Headless Soldier, Mezzo MASS (The Belfast Ensemble), Julia Ashes (Opera Workshop), performed The Boy The Musician, DUP Voices Abomination: a DUP Opera (The Belfast Ensemble), Maeve Bloody Murder (Opera Workshop), participated in research and development sessions Mezzo Harbour (Replay Theatre) and performed the first staged production of Freya Waley-Cohen’s Mezzo Spell Book (Longborough Festival Opera).
Equally at home on the concert platform, recital appearances incorporate Royal Opera House Live at Lunch, Oxford Lieder Festival, UK Strauss Society, Cameratina with Roderick Williams OBE and Susanna Stranders, DEBUT Shoreditch Treehouse, DEBUT Brunel Museum, Chester Music Festival, Irish Songmakers, National Concert Hall of Dublin, Belfast Music Society, Dolgellau Music Club, Rhyl Music Club, Mousaverse, Egerton Music Club, Queen’s University of Belfast, Birr Music Festival and Dublin Song Series with Finghin Collins and the RTE Contempo Quartet. Prominent conductors of solo engagements include Vasily Petrenko with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra Beethoven Ninth Symphony, Michael Collins MBE De Falla El amor brujo, Gergely Madaras V Williams Serenade to Music and Sir Mark Elder Mendelssohn A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Extensive UK and Ireland concert performances include eight Bach Cantatas, Bach B Minor Mass, Magnificat, Elgar Sea Pictures, Music Makers, Mahler Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen, Mozart Requiem, Charpentier Messe di Minuet, Haydn Harmoniemesse, Nelsonmesse, Theresienmesse, Brahms Alto Rhapsody, Duruflé Requiem, Handel Dixit Dominus, Esther, Britten Rejoice in the Lamb, Jenkins The Armed Man, Requiem, Vivaldi Dixit Dominus, Gloria, Magnificat (RV 610 & RV 611), Saint-Saens Requiem, Respighi Il Tramonto, Rossini Petite Messe solennelle and Schoenberg Pierrot Lunaire. International concert credits include Monte Carlo Handel Messiah and an opera gala in Soriano nel Cimino. Other notable opera galas include Bernstein à la Carte directed by Roberto Recchia, English National Opera Opera Works Artists at Sadler’s Wells, Ulster Touring Opera, and Brunwick Vocal Arts conducted by Gary Matthewman.
Radio Ulster has featured Sarah regularly and she has been broadcast on BBC Radio 3 (Corcoran’s Alto Rhapsodies with The Ulster Orchestra and an extract of Schumann’s Gedichte der Königin Maria Stuart with David Jones), BBC Sounds (World Book Day), RTE Lyric FM (Wexford Festival Opera and Lyric Opera Productions), PBS and worldwide as a soloist for the Irish Rugby Football Union. Stretto Records released Songs of Spring and Winter conducted by Paul Daniel featuring Sarah as a soloist alongside Sipho Fubesi. Competition successes include Dame Janet Baker bestowing her The Joyce and Michael Kennedy Award for the Singing of Strauss, Premio Speciale Mozart at Concorso Lirico Arturo Toscanini, Best Performance in German at Donauwelle International Music Competition, Lieder Finalist at DEBUT Contest in Weikersheim Germany and The National Concert Hall’s Bernadette Greevy Award for Singers.
Sarah was an English National Opera Opera Works Artist, Wexford Festival Opera Factory Artist (Gerard Arnhold Bursary Recipient and Emerging Young Artist Award with PwC), Britten Pears Young Artist (Elizabeth Harwood Award), DEBUT Horizon Artist and trained on the National Opera Studio Short Course and with British Youth Opera. She graduated from the RNCM, with Distinction, as a Drapers’ de Turckheim Scholar. Sarah is grateful to be supported by The Arts Council of Northern Ireland.