Louise Kemény

A graduate of the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, Louise Kemény is a former Britten-Pears Young Artist, Independent Opera Fellow and Yeoman of the Worshipful Company of Musicians. She is the recipient of the Ian Smith of Stornoway Opera Prize, Basil A.Turner Prize, Joaninha Trust Prize and David Goldman Award.

In 2018/19 and 2019/20 Louise Kemény was an ensemble member at Theater Bonn, performing roles such as Pamina/Die Zauberflöte, Gretel/Hänsel und Gretel, Sophie/Der Rosenkavalier, Susanna/Le Nozze di Figaro, Romilda/Xerxes and Marzelline/Fidelio. Earlier this year, she also gave an acclaimed debut at the 2020 Händelfestspiele Karlsruhe as Seleuce in a new production of Tolomeo, directed by Benjamin Lazar and conducted by Federico Maria Sardelli. She will reprise the role later this season.

Other appearances include Barbarina/Le nozze di Figaro for De Nationale Opera Amsterdam, Iphis/Jephtha in Hanover, Teofane/Ottone for English Touring Opera, Tiny/Paul Bunyan and Little Moon-Soprano Actor/A Night at the Chinese Opera for British Youth Opera, Tytania/A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Jano/Jenufa for Scottish Opera, Poppea/Agrippina for Iford Arts and Second Woman/Dido and Aeneas for La Nuova Musica at Wigmore Hall. Louise Kemény is passionate about new music and has created three lead roles in new operas – Woman/Unknown Position and Girl/Bonesong (Kate Whitley), and Wife/Nauset(Joel Rust) – to critical acclaim.
  
Concert highlights include Mendelssohn’s Elijah, conducted by Christopher Moulds, and Brahms’ Ein deutsches Requiem, both with the Sinfonieorchester Basel, the soprano solos in Bach’s Weihnachtsoratorium with Concerto Köln and Peter Dijkstra, Bach’s Matthäus-Passion with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, directed by Mark Padmore, Rossini’s Stabat Mater at the Kasseler Musiktage, 1st Soprano in Mozart’s Mass in c minor at Snape Maltings, Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis at King’s College Chapel, Cambridge, and Orff’s Carmina Burana at Cadogan Hall. Later this season she will perform Schubert’s Mass in a flat with Choeur Accentus and Laurence Equilbey in Rouen and at La Seine Musicale in Paris.

A keen exponent of 20th century and contemporary repertoire, Kemény has performed Stravinsky’s Les noces with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, and a programme with Schoenberg’s 2nd Quartet, Pierrot Lunaire, Ravel’s Trois Poèmes de Mallarmé and Stravinsky’s 3 Japanese Lyrics at London’s Conway Hall.
 
In recital, Louise Kemény has appeared at the MozartFest Würzburg, and with Malcolm Martineau at the Bath Festival in a programme of Spanish song. For Oxford Lieder Festival she sang Schubert’s Der Hirt auf dem Felsen and Schoenberg’s 2nd Quartet, and at St John’s Smith Square in a solo recital featuring works by Strauss, Britten, Ravel, Debussy and Chausson. She has also been a guest at Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, Wigmore Hall and Snape Maltings. A recording of early songs by Samuel Barber is planned for autumn 2020.