With polished, elegant vocalism and committed dramatic portrayals on-stage, American mezzo-soprano Jamie Van Eyck appeals to audiences and critics alike as a compelling young artist in opera and concert. She embarks upon the 2010-2011 season with a Boston Lyric Opera debut as The Drummer in The Emperor of Atlantis, and as The Daughter in the premiere performances of After-Image, a newly commissioned opera. She will also return to Utah Opera as Meg in Little Women. In concert, she sings The Messiah with the Lexington Philharmonic, and Mahler’s Symphony #2 with The Madison Symphony.
Last season, she made her role and company debut as Cherubino in The Marriage of Figaro for Opera Theater of Saint Louis, and appeared at the Bard SummerScape Festival in the role of Milli in Franz Schreker’s Der Ferne Klang. She sang Mercédès in Carmen and Miss Jessel in The Turn of the Screw with Madison Opera, and reprised the roles of Dido and The Sorceress in Dido and Aeneas with The Mark Morris Dance Group and Kolobov Novaya Opera Theater on tour to Moscow for performances at The Golden Mask Festival. She performed works by James Primosch and George Crumb with Orchestra 2001 of Philadelphia, with whom she is a frequent guest artist.
Ms. Van Eyck has performed with opera companies throughout the United States including Santa Fe Opera, Opera Theater of Saint Louis, Utah Opera, Opera Boston, Madison Opera, and The Wolf Trap Opera Company. During her consecutive residencies at Wolf Trap Opera, she sang the roles of Dorabella in Così fan tutte, Melanto in Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria, and Dryade in Ariadne auf Naxos. She was also featured in Bernstein’s Mass with the Utah Symphony, and in the role of The Old Lady in Candide with The National Symphony Orchestra, for which The Washington Times declared “her robust and authoritative instrument carried the day.” She made her Broadway debut in Jerome Kern’s Music in the Air with the Encores! series at New York City Center. With the Santa Fe Opera, Ms. Van Eyck covered the role of Junon in Plateé and performed scenes as Sister Helen in Jake Heggie’s Dead Man Walking.… read more
Among Ms. Van Eyck’s recent concert performances are Handel’s Messiah with The Utah Symphony, Berlioz’s Les Nuits d’Été with City Music-Cleveland, Schönberg’s Peirrot Lunaire with The New England Contemporary Ensemble, and Mahler’s Symphony No.2 and Das Lied von der Erde in Boston with The Harvard-Radcliffe Symphony. At Wolf Trap, Ms. Van Eyck twice performed in recital with acclaimed pianist Steven Blier, and was a soloist in This Way to Broadway with Marvin Hamlisch and The National Symphony. She has also been featured in multiple Pops concerts with conductor Keith Lockhart.
An avid proponent of new music, Ms. Van Eyck sang two world premiere performances at Carnegie Hall during the spring of 2009. She gave the premiere performance of Ned Rorem’s Three Poems of Edna St. Vincent Millay in Weill Recital Hall, and in Zankel Hall she sang the first performance of Helen Enfettered, written for her by young American composer, Kate Soper. At the Tanglewood Music Center’s Festival of Contemporary Music, she performed the role of Mama in the North American staged premiere of Elliott Carter’s What Next? under the baton of James Levine. Her performance can be seen on the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s DVD release of the opera. She has been featured in Osvaldo Golijov’s Ainadamar with Dawn Upshaw and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and has worked closely with celebrated American composer George Crumb, singing the 2007 world premiere performance of his American Songbook 5: Voices from a Forgotten World with Orchestra 2001 of Philadelphia. The song cycle marks her second recording with Bridge Records of New York.
