Meagan Miller
Encyclopedia
Meagan Miller is a soprano who has performed on opera, recital and concert stages all over the world.
in New York City
, where she received her bachelor's degree, then continued her studies with the Juilliard Opera Center. Her major teachers during her education were Mary Ellen Schauber, Dan Pressley, Josepha Gayer, and Cynthia Hoffmann. During recent years, she has also studied with Ruth Falcon and Kammersaengerin Hilde Zadek.
Ms. Miller is the 2008 winner of George London/Kirsten Flagstad Award sponsored by the New York Community Trust. Miller was also one of five winners of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions in 1999, a competition in which many successful opera stars from the United States first reached public notice. Miller performed "Martern aller Arten" from Die Entführung aus dem Serail
and "Ain't it a Pretty Night?" from Carlisle Floyd's "Susannah" with the orchestra conducted by Edoardo Muller, in a performance that The New York Times
described as proving "her agility, thrust and command of intonation', with a voice that is "strong and brilliant".
An accomplished recitalist and noted interpreter of new music, Meagan Miller has appeared in more than thirty professional recitals at such notable venues as Alice Tully Hall, Weill Hall, the Austrian Cultural Forum, the Kosciuszko Foundation, the Juilliard Theater, Steinway Hall, Merkin Concert Hall, Brown University, Princeton University, the Morgan Library, Salzburg’s Schloss Leopoldskron, and the Chrysler Museum. She has premiered many works written specifically for her voice, including Libby Larsen’s Try Me Good King: The Last Words of the Wives of Henry VIII and Robert Beaser’s Four Poems of Emily Dickinson. Ms. Miller has also premiered numerous works by Thomas Cipullo, Christopher Berg, and Russell Platt.
On the operatic stage, Ms. Miller has performed Mozart’s Fiordiligi, Donna Anna, Donna Elvira, Konstanze, and Countess Almaviva, as well as Verdi’s Violetta and Desdemona, Puccini’s Musetta, Gounod’s Marguerite, Johann Strauss’ Rosalinda, Gluck’s Euridice, Floyd’s Susannah, and Copland’s Laurie. Her interpretations of these roles have been applauded at the Opera Orchestra of New York, New York City Opera, Minnesota Opera, L’Opéra de Montréal, Orlando Opera, Kentucky Opera, Syracuse Opera, Eugene Opera, San Francisco Opera’s Merola Program, Wolf Trap Opera, the Princeton Symphony, and the Minnesota Orchestra. Ms. Miller’s other roles include Verdi's Alice Ford, Barber's Cleopatra, Strauss’ Arabella, Lehar’s Merry Widow (Hannah), and Bizet’s Micaëla.
Recent orchestral engagements have taken Ms. Miller to such venues as Hong Kong’s Cultural Center, Rotterdam’s De Dolen, the Hollywood Bowl, Carnegie Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, Minneapolis’ Orchestra Hall, and the Kennedy Center as a soloist in Beethoven’s Mass in C, Missa Solemnis, and Symphony No. 9, Handel’s Messiah, Haydn’s Creation, Brahms’ Ein Deutsches Requiem, Mozart’s Requiem and Exsultate, jubilate, Bruckner’s Mass in f-minor, Poulenc’s Gloria, Dvorak’s Requiem, Vaughan Williams’ Dona Nobis Pacem, and Orff’s Carmina Burana. Ms. Miller has performed under the batons of Edoardo Mueller, Harry Bicket, Eiji Oue, Lawrence Foster, Randall Behr, Christopher Larkin, Stephen Lord, Joseph Rescigno, and Roger Norrington.
Ms. Miller has completed several residencies with the Marilyn Horne Foundation and the Wolf Trap Foundation, blending outreach and performance. A grand finals winner of the 1999 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, Meagan Miller was named “the Outstanding Undergraduate Musician” by the Juilliard faculty, and was honored with the Juilliard Opera Center’s DeRosa Award. She has also won the Liederkranz Foundation Competition, a Richard Tucker Music Foundation Study Grant, Syracuse Opera’s Season’s Best Performance, and the Joy In Singing Award, which led to her acclaimed New York Debut recital in the fall of 1998.
Miller's art song recitals in New York have often been reviewed by The New York Times -- one example is a 2002 recital at Merkin Concert Hall
, in which Miller performed a group of Richard Strauss
songs that opened with "Das Rosenband" (Op. 36, No. 1), and also included "Meinem Kinde" (Op. 37, No. 3) and "Ständchen" (Op. 17, No. 2). Miller performed Francis Poulenc
's Trois Poèmes de Louise de Vilmorin and Métamorphoses, and Claude Debussy
's early Proses Lyriques, followed by Robert Beaser
's Four Dickinson Songs. The New York Times described Miller as "an agreeably flexible interpreter" with "considereable communicative powers" who sang "with a combination of gracefulness and energy that got to the core of the music she offered".
Early life
Miller was born in Wilmington, DE and grew up in West Chester OH, and Chadds Ford, PA. As a high school student at Archmere Academy, Miller was exposed to much classical music, and also studied German intensely. She was selected for the 1991 Pennsylvania Governor's School for the Arts, an experience that formed her goal to be a professional singer. Miller attended Washington and Lee University in Lexingon, VA for two years, where she performed her first operatic role, the Countess in Mozart's the Marriage of Figaro, and also gave her first solo recital. Miller then transferred to the Juilliard SchoolJuilliard School
The Juilliard School, located at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York City, United States, is a performing arts conservatory which was established in 1905...
in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, where she received her bachelor's degree, then continued her studies with the Juilliard Opera Center. Her major teachers during her education were Mary Ellen Schauber, Dan Pressley, Josepha Gayer, and Cynthia Hoffmann. During recent years, she has also studied with Ruth Falcon and Kammersaengerin Hilde Zadek.
Career
In June of 2009, Meagan Miller made a celebrated European operatic debut as Ariadne in the Vienna Volksoper's new production of Richard Strauss' Ariadne auf Naxos. This has led to a new facet of her career: the leading ladies of Mozart, Strauss and Wagner in important opera houses all over the world.Ms. Miller is the 2008 winner of George London/Kirsten Flagstad Award sponsored by the New York Community Trust. Miller was also one of five winners of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions in 1999, a competition in which many successful opera stars from the United States first reached public notice. Miller performed "Martern aller Arten" from Die Entführung aus dem Serail
Die Entführung aus dem Serail
Die Entführung aus dem Serail is an opera Singspiel in three acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The German libretto is by Christoph Friedrich Bretzner with adaptations by Gottlieb Stephanie...
and "Ain't it a Pretty Night?" from Carlisle Floyd's "Susannah" with the orchestra conducted by Edoardo Muller, in a performance that The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
described as proving "her agility, thrust and command of intonation', with a voice that is "strong and brilliant".
An accomplished recitalist and noted interpreter of new music, Meagan Miller has appeared in more than thirty professional recitals at such notable venues as Alice Tully Hall, Weill Hall, the Austrian Cultural Forum, the Kosciuszko Foundation, the Juilliard Theater, Steinway Hall, Merkin Concert Hall, Brown University, Princeton University, the Morgan Library, Salzburg’s Schloss Leopoldskron, and the Chrysler Museum. She has premiered many works written specifically for her voice, including Libby Larsen’s Try Me Good King: The Last Words of the Wives of Henry VIII and Robert Beaser’s Four Poems of Emily Dickinson. Ms. Miller has also premiered numerous works by Thomas Cipullo, Christopher Berg, and Russell Platt.
On the operatic stage, Ms. Miller has performed Mozart’s Fiordiligi, Donna Anna, Donna Elvira, Konstanze, and Countess Almaviva, as well as Verdi’s Violetta and Desdemona, Puccini’s Musetta, Gounod’s Marguerite, Johann Strauss’ Rosalinda, Gluck’s Euridice, Floyd’s Susannah, and Copland’s Laurie. Her interpretations of these roles have been applauded at the Opera Orchestra of New York, New York City Opera, Minnesota Opera, L’Opéra de Montréal, Orlando Opera, Kentucky Opera, Syracuse Opera, Eugene Opera, San Francisco Opera’s Merola Program, Wolf Trap Opera, the Princeton Symphony, and the Minnesota Orchestra. Ms. Miller’s other roles include Verdi's Alice Ford, Barber's Cleopatra, Strauss’ Arabella, Lehar’s Merry Widow (Hannah), and Bizet’s Micaëla.
Recent orchestral engagements have taken Ms. Miller to such venues as Hong Kong’s Cultural Center, Rotterdam’s De Dolen, the Hollywood Bowl, Carnegie Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, Minneapolis’ Orchestra Hall, and the Kennedy Center as a soloist in Beethoven’s Mass in C, Missa Solemnis, and Symphony No. 9, Handel’s Messiah, Haydn’s Creation, Brahms’ Ein Deutsches Requiem, Mozart’s Requiem and Exsultate, jubilate, Bruckner’s Mass in f-minor, Poulenc’s Gloria, Dvorak’s Requiem, Vaughan Williams’ Dona Nobis Pacem, and Orff’s Carmina Burana. Ms. Miller has performed under the batons of Edoardo Mueller, Harry Bicket, Eiji Oue, Lawrence Foster, Randall Behr, Christopher Larkin, Stephen Lord, Joseph Rescigno, and Roger Norrington.
Ms. Miller has completed several residencies with the Marilyn Horne Foundation and the Wolf Trap Foundation, blending outreach and performance. A grand finals winner of the 1999 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, Meagan Miller was named “the Outstanding Undergraduate Musician” by the Juilliard faculty, and was honored with the Juilliard Opera Center’s DeRosa Award. She has also won the Liederkranz Foundation Competition, a Richard Tucker Music Foundation Study Grant, Syracuse Opera’s Season’s Best Performance, and the Joy In Singing Award, which led to her acclaimed New York Debut recital in the fall of 1998.
Miller's art song recitals in New York have often been reviewed by The New York Times -- one example is a 2002 recital at Merkin Concert Hall
Merkin Concert Hall
Merkin Concert Hall is a 449-seat concert hall in Manhattan, New York City. The hall, named in honor of Hermann and Ursula Merkin, is part of the Kaufman Center, a complex that includes the Lucy Moses School, a community arts school, and the Special Music School , a New York City public school for...
, in which Miller performed a group of Richard Strauss
Richard Strauss
Richard Georg Strauss was a leading German composer of the late Romantic and early modern eras. He is known for his operas, which include Der Rosenkavalier and Salome; his Lieder, especially his Four Last Songs; and his tone poems and orchestral works, such as Death and Transfiguration, Till...
songs that opened with "Das Rosenband" (Op. 36, No. 1), and also included "Meinem Kinde" (Op. 37, No. 3) and "Ständchen" (Op. 17, No. 2). Miller performed Francis Poulenc
Francis Poulenc
Francis Jean Marcel Poulenc was a French composer and a member of the French group Les six. He composed solo piano music, chamber music, oratorio, choral music, opera, ballet music, and orchestral music...
's Trois Poèmes de Louise de Vilmorin and Métamorphoses, and Claude Debussy
Claude Debussy
Claude-Achille Debussy was a French composer. Along with Maurice Ravel, he was one of the most prominent figures working within the field of impressionist music, though he himself intensely disliked the term when applied to his compositions...
's early Proses Lyriques, followed by Robert Beaser
Robert Beaser
Robert Beaser is an American composer.-Biography:Beaser was brought up in a non-musical family. His father was a physician and mother was a chemist. He grew up in Newton, Massachusetts where he distinguished himself at a young age as a percussionist, composer and conductor...
's Four Dickinson Songs. The New York Times described Miller as "an agreeably flexible interpreter" with "considereable communicative powers" who sang "with a combination of gracefulness and energy that got to the core of the music she offered".