Critically-acclaimed soprano Halley Gilbert is quickly establishing herself as a vocal and dramatic force to be reckoned with. Of her star turn as the saucy comedienne Zerbinetta in Utopia Opera’s production of Ariadne auf Naxos, James Jorden of the New York Observer wrote: “Stealing the show was Halley Gilbert as Zerbinetta, flinging out crystalline trills, arpeggios, staccati and roulades with an almost lazy insouciance…. Ms. Gilbert’s frankness....made the text sound like it could have been written yesterday.” She has performed multiple leading roles with Bronx Opera, including Donna Anna in Don Giovanni, Constanze in The Abduction from the Seraglio, Birdie in Regina, Susanna in The Marriage of Figaro, Miss Wordsworth in Albert Herring, Violetta in La traviata, and Lucy in the US premiere of Kirke Mechem’s The Rivals.
A fan of performing new works, she has also premiered Rautavaara's Vigilia (soprano soloist) with the Great Music in a Great Space concert series, David Gilbert's Toward the One and Three Songs of Youth with the Greenwich Symphony and Eastman School of Music respectively, and many more.
Other roles include Lucia in Lucia di Lammermoor, Cunégonde in Candide, Gilda in Rigoletto, Adina in L’elisir d’amore, Le feu in L’enfant et les sortileges, Baby Doe in The Ballad of Baby Doe, Marzelline in Fidelio, and Frasquita in Carmen with such companies as New Jersey State Repertory Opera, Opera Company of Brooklyn, New York Lyric Opera Theatre, and Opera for Humanity.
Halley is a graduate of the Eastman School of Music, where her roles included Female Chorus in Rape of Lucretia, Arminda in La finta giardiniera, and La Fée in Cendrillon. She has made solo concert appearances with the Cathedral of St. John the Divine concert series: Great Music in a Great Space, Greenwich Symphony Orchestra, Lake Placid Sinfonietta, Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra, Bronx Arts Ensemble, Music at Christ Church Oyster Bay, and Rutgers Symphony Orchestra, performing such diverse repertoire as Mahler’s Second Symphony, Canteloube’s Chants d’Auvergne, Mozart’s Requiem, Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915, Handel’s Messiah, and Mozart's Great Mass in C minor.
Halley has enjoyed considerable success in competition, placing first in the Jenny Lind Competition, the Opera Idol Competition NYC, and the Steinway Hall Vocal Competition, and finishing as a Regional Finalist in the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. In addition to earning a Bachelor of Music degree from the Eastman School of Music, she is an alumna of the Boston University Tanglewood Institute, the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, Manhattan School of Music’s Preparatory Division, and New York University’s Deutches Haus.
Halley resides in Nutley, New Jersey.
