Mezzo-soprano Colette McGahon began her studies with Dr Veronica
Dunne in DIT Conservatory of Music and Drama in Dublin before being
awarded two Arts Council Scholarships enabling her to attend the
Guildhall School of Music and Drama and the National Opera Studio
in London. While in London she was a finalist in the Kathleen
Ferrier Memorial competition and won the Miriam Licette Prize which
enabled her to specialise in the study of French Song.
Her professional debut was in the Wexford Festival Opera
production of Crispino e la Comare. Subsequent operatic roles
include Ottavia in L'incoronazione di Poppea; Marcellina in Le
nozze di Figaro; Kostelnicka in Jenufa; Mrs Grose in The Turn of
the Screw; and the title role in Carmen, among others. In the
course of her career Colette has worked with, among others,
conductors Sir Simon Rattle, Bernard Haitink, Ivor Bolton and has
been directed by Sir Peter Hall, Trevor Nunn and Richard Jones.
Roles created for her voice include The Dublin Operas of John
Buckley, Raymond Deane and Marion Ingoldsby commissioned by Opera
Theatre Company; James Wilson’s A Passionate Man; John Browne’s The
Pied Piper of Hamelin; and Raymond Deane’s chamber opera The Wall
of Cloud.
Colette has appeared with Opera Ireland, Opera Northern Ireland,
Opera Theatre Company, Glyndebourne Touring Opera, Opera 80, the
festivals of Covent Garden, Buxton, Glyndebourne and Longborough
and at the BBC Proms. She has given recitals in the Purcell Room
and the Queen Elizabeth Hall, both on London’s South Bank, Hugh
Lane Gallery, Bank of Ireland Arts Centre, National Concert Hall in
Dublin, BT Studio at the Waterfront Hall in Belfast; and she has
recorded C.V. Stanford’s Requiem on the Marco Polo label.
Colette McGahon’s recent opera seasons saw her make a highly
acclaimed Wagnerian debut singing the role of Waltraute in
Götterdämmerung for Longborough Festival Opera. She has since added
Fricka in Das Rheingold and Die Walküre to her Wagnerian
roles. Colette sang Waltraute with the National Youth
Orchestra of Ireland in performances given in the University
Concert Hall Limerick and Symphony Hall Birmingham, conducted by
Alexander Annissimov. Recent performances include Wagner’s
Wesendonck Lieder in the Sunday @ Noon recital series at the Hugh
Lane Gallery.
Colette is as a founder and Artistic Director of the
award-winning Opera Collective Ireland (formerly Irish Youth
Opera). The work of the company, which provides professional
performance opportunities for emerging Irish artists in the early
stages of their careers, has been received with enormous critical
acclaim. Both IYO's productions to date , Britten's The Rape of
Lucretia and Handel's Agrippina were nominated for Best Opera in
the Irish Times Irish Theatre Awards while the 2015 production of
Agrippina won Best Production in the Tiger Dublin Fringe
Awards.
In the field of education Colette, a First Class Honours Masters
graduate of Cork School of Music, is a Lecturer in Voice at DIT
Conservatory of Music and Drama and is also much in demand as an
adjudicator and examiner. She has been invited to give
Masterclasses in Ireland, UK and France. With a growing
international reputation, her students are now among the rising
operatic stars on the international scene performing with major UK
and European companies including among others the Royal Opera
Covent Garden, Glyndebourne Festival, Scottish Opera, Welsh
National Opera, Opera North, Aix-en-Provence and La Scala
Milan.