Lauren Flanigan

Lauren Flanigan (born May 18, 1959) is an American operatic soprano who has had an active international career since the 1980s. She enjoyed a particularly fruitful partnership with the New York City Opera, appearing with the company almost every year since 1990. She has sung more than 100 different opera roles on stage during her career, often appearing in contemporary works or more rarely staged operas.Opera News stated that, "Flanigan has enjoyed one of the most distinctive careers of any artist of her generation, one marked by a high volume of contemporary works. Modern composers love her because of her innate musicality, dramatic power and lightning-fast skills and instincts."

Flanigan was born in San Francisco, California, the daughter of Irish and Pennsylvania Dutch parents. In 1971, at the age of 12, she appeared as Flora in Benjamin Britten's The Turn of the Screw with the San Francisco Western Opera Theatre. Her portrayal of Flora resulted in being offered a full scholarship to study music, violin and voice in the pre-college program at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. While there she studied voice with Alice Taylor. She went on to earn a Bachelor of Music degree from Boston University where she was a voice student of Mac Morgan. She pursued graduate studies in vocal performance with Judith Raskin at the Manhattan School of Music, earning a Master of Music degree in 1984. In 1986 she was accepted as a post graduate student in voice at the Juilliard School.

Flanigan credits much of her early experience to the singular interest of Dr. Robert Larsen of the Des Moines Metro Opera where in 1985 she was cast as Clorinda in Gioachino Rossini's La Cenerentola and as Curley's Wife in Carlisle Floyd's Of Mice and Men. This was followed by performances in 1987 as Musetta in Giacomo Puccini's La bohème and Miss Jessel in The Turn of the Screw; 1989 as Rosalinda in Johann Strauss II's Die Fledermaus; and 1990 in Britten's Peter Grimes. In 1986 she performed the role of Leila in Georges Bizet's Les Pecheurs de Perles for the Hawaii Opera Theatre. In 1987 she appeared in the world premiere of Stewart Wallace's Where's Dick? with Opera Omaha under the direction of Anne Bogart. She later reprised that role at the Houston Grand Opera in 1989. She returned to Omaha in 1988 to perform the role of Sophie Scholl in the United States premiere of Udo Zimmermann's Weiße Rose.

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