Nicole Cabell

Nicole Cabell, the 2005 Winner of the BBC Singer of the World Competition in Cardiff and Decca recording artist, is one of the most sought-after lyric sopranos of today. Her solo debut album, “Soprano” was named “Editor’s Choice” by Gramophone and has received an incredible amount of critical acclaim and several prestigious awards, including the 2007 Georg Solti Orphée d’Or from the French Académie du Disque Lyrique.

This season Nicole Cabell makes both a company and a role debut when she sings Donna Anna in Don Giovanni with the Royal Swedish Opera and returns to Tucson to perform Poulenc’s Gloria and a solo recital.

Last season Ms. Cabell returned to the BBC Proms for a concert of George Walker’s Lilacs, before performing the Countess in Le Nozze di Figaro with the Pittsburgh Opera. Further opera performances included Bess in Porgy and Bess with Opera Carolina and North Carolina Opera and concerts of Clara in the same opera with the NDR and Alan Gilbert at the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg. In concert, Ms. Cabell sang Messiah with the Seattle Symphony, Vaughan-Williams’ Sea Symphony with the Atlanta Symphony and Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 with the Rochester Philharmonic.

Nicole Cabell’s past season included a triumphant return to the San Francisco Opera in her role debut as Fiordiligi in Così Fan Tutte, performances in London and on tour in the United States with the London Symphony Orchestra and Simon Rattle performing George Walker’s Lilacs (a piece she repeated for her return with the Cleveland Orchestra with Franz Welser-Möst), a solo recital with Cincinnati’s Matinee Musicale and concerts of Barber’s Knoxville, Summer of 1915 and Mahler’s 4th Symphony with the Tucson Symphony, Handel’s Messiah with the Philadelphia Orchestra and with the Apollo Chorus of Chicago on the occasion of their 150th anniversary, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 with the Cincinnati May Festival and Brahms’ Ein Deutsches Requiem with the Buffalo Philharmonic. In the summer she joined the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Andris Nelsons for Barber’s Knoxville, Summer of 1915 and for Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni before going to the Grand Teton Music Festival for Mimi in La Bohème with Donald Runnicles.

The previous season included a debut with Opera Theatre of St Louis as Mary in William Grant Still’s Highway 1, USA with Leonard Slatkin and a virtual performance of Britten’s Les Illuminations and of Lumee’s Aria by Ellen Reid with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra.

Prior to that, she returned to Michigan Opera Theatre for Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni, to the Boston Symphony for Poulenc’s Gloria with Andris Nelsons and to the Atlanta Symphony for Mahler’s Symphony No. 8 with Robert Spano.

Nicole Cabell opened the previous season with her first stage performances of Bess in Porgy and Bess with the English National Opera to incredible public and critical acclaim. She also made her Pittsburgh Opera debut as Mimi in La Bohème before returning to the Minnesota Opera for Violetta in La Traviata and to the Cincinnati Opera for Juliette in Roméo et Juliette. In concert, Ms. Cabell performed a set of songs on texts by Langston Hughes at the Metropolitan Museum, sang the Mozart Requiem with the Cincinnati Symphony and David Robertson before joining Master Voices and Ted Sperling at New York’s Alice Tully Hall. In the summer she returned to Tanglewood for the closing concert of the season as the soprano soloist in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 with Giancarlo Guerrero.

Prior to that, Ms. Cabell performed the Countess in Le Nozze di Figaro with the Grand Théâtre de Genève, Flavia in Eliogabalo with the Dutch National Opera, the Countess in Le Nozze di Figaro with Michigan Opera Theatre, and Micaela in Carmen with the Atlanta Opera. Ms. Cabell was also heard in recital at the Frankfurt Opera, Carnegie Hall, the Harris Theater for Music in Dance in Chicago, the University Musical Society in Ann Arbor, and in Louisville, Kentucky. In concert, Nicole Cabell performed with the Lake Forest Symphony (Sisters in Song, a joint program with Alyson Cambridge, which was just commercially released by Cedille Records), the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic, and in Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 with the Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra.

Ms. Cabell’s 2016-2017 season featured her debut as Bess in Porgy in Bess with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, as well as performances of Mimi in La Bohème with the Minnesota Opera and the Cincinnati Opera and of the Countess in Le Nozze di Figaro with Angers Nantes Opera in France. In concert, she sang Shéhérazade with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 with the Nashville Symphony and Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis with the Oregon Bach Festival.

The 2015-2016 season included Ms. Cabell’s debut at the Grand Théâtre de Genève in the title role of Handel’s Alcina and returns to the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden as Violetta in La Traviata, to the Atlanta Opera as Juliette in Roméo et Juliette, to the Michigan Opera Theatre as Mimi in La Bohème and to the Cincinnati Opera in a new role: Rosalinde in Die Fledermaus. On the concert stage, Ms. Cabell performed Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 in Hiroshima and Nagasaki and a solo recital in Baltimore.

Nicole Cabell’s 2014-2015 season included semi-staged concerts of Don Giovanni with Edo de Waart and the Milwaukee Symphony, her Opéra National de Paris debut (and role debut) as Mimi in La Bohème and Adina in L’Elisir d’Amore with the Minnesota Opera as well as a return to Washington Concert Opera as Giulietta in I Capuleti ed i Montecchi. In concert, she was heard with the Boston Symphony Orchestra in Villa-Lobos’ Bachianas Brasileiras no. 5, with the Orchestre National de Lille in Poulenc’s Stabat Mater, with the San Diego Symphony in Strauss’ Four Last Songs, with the London Symphony Orchestra in Debussy’s La Damoiselle Elue, in a Puccini-Strauss gala concert in Hong-Kong, as Bess in an abridged version of Porgy and Bess at Ravinia with Bobby McFerrin, at the Oregon Bach Festival in Mahler’s Symphony No. 2, at Bard’s Music Festival in Villa-Lobos’ Forest of the Amazon and at SUNY Potsdam in Brahms’ Ein deutsches Requiem.

In the previous season Nicole Cabell made some exciting role debuts: first as Violetta in La Traviata with Michigan Opera Theatre (seen again later in the season at the San Francisco Opera), then as Medora in Il Corsaro with Washington Concert Opera. She reprised the role of her triumphant San Francisco Opera debut: Giulietta in I Capuleti e i Montecchi with the Lyric Opera of Kansas City. In concert, Ms. Cabell made her Paris debut in Poulenc’s Stabat Mater, appeared several times in Spain, first with the Orquesta de Galicia in a Barber/Mahler program, then on tour with the RPO and Charles Dutoit in Poulenc’s Gloria. In London, she was heard with the RPO in the same Poulenc piece as well as with the BBC Orchestra, first in Barber’s Knoxville, Summer of 1915 with Keith Lockhart and later in Elgar’s The Apostles with Sir Andrew Davis. Further concert appearances included duke Ellington’s Sacred Music at Carnegie Hall, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 with the Boston Symphony and Charles Dutoit at Tanglewood, and finally in a Barber/Brahms program in Nashville with GianCarlo Guerrero. Nicole Cabell also appeared in recital in Chicago.

Awards include first place in both the Palm Beach Opera Vocal Competition and the Women's Board of Chicago Vocal Competition. Nicole Cabell was a semi-finalist in the 2005 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions and earned first place in the American Opera Society competition in Chicago. She is the 2002 winner of the Union League's Rose M. Grundman Scholarship, and the 2002 Farwell Award with the Woman's Board of Chicago. Nicole Cabell holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Vocal Performance from the Eastman School of Music.