Gillian Ramm

Soprano

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  Gillian Ramm is fast emerging as one of the most exciting and versatile young sopranos on the British operatic scene. Australian born, she completed her undergraduate training at the Western Australian Conservatorium of Music, moving on to the Young Artist Programme with West Australian Opera. After winning multiple prizes in the 2002 Australian Singing Competition, she travelled to England to take up a scholarship at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester. There she was generously supported by the Peter Moores Foundation, the Tait Foundation and the Ian Potter Foundation of Australia, and completed both her Post Graduate Diploma and Professional Performance Diploma with Distinction. Gillian was also awarded the John Cameron Lieder Prize and the Ricordi Prize for Opera.

  Operatic engagements include Fiordiligi Così fan tutte (Glyndebourne Festival Opera and Glyndebourne on Tour, Budapest Festival Orchestra), Rosalinde Die Fledermaus (Glyndebourne on Tour), Second Niece Peter Grimes (Teatro di San Carlo), Aci Aci Galatea e Polifemo (London Handel Festival), Valencienne The Merry Widow (West Australian Opera), Anne Truelove The Rake’s Progress (RNCM), Clorinda La Cenerentola (Ryedale Festival), Yum Yum The Mikado for Carl Rosa, Tytania A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Vitellia La clemenza di Tito for English Touring Opera, and her debut with English National Opera as First Niece in a new production of Peter Grimes.

  Gillian has sung in concert with The Classical Opera Company, Opera North, the London Philharmonic Orchestra (Mahler’s Das Klagende Lied and Korngold’s Das Wunder der Heliane) and Teatro Comunale di Bologna (Bach’s St John Passion). She has performed solo recitals at the London Handel Festival, St James’ Piccadilly, Royal Overseas House, London and the Blackwood Chamber Music Festival (Australia). She has also recorded two song recitals for ABC Classic FM Australia, and her Lieder repertoire ranges from Mozart, Schubert and Schumann to Grieg, Rachmaninov and Debussy. Gillian’s concert repertoire includes Mozart’s Mass in C Minor and Requiem, Handel’s Messiah, Haydn’s The Creation and The Seasons and Mahler’s Symphony No 4.

  Recent and future highlights include First Niece in Peter Grimes for Opera de Oviedo and at the BBC Proms, Fiordiligi Così fan tutte for Salzburger Landestheater conducted by Leo Hussain, Messiah with Paul McCreesh and the Orquesta Filarmónica de Gran Canaria, the title role in Handel’s Rodelinda with the Early Opera Company conducted by Christian Curnyn, and Aci Aci Galatea e Polifemo at the Göttingen Handel Festival, conducted by Laurence Cummings.

  Gillian Ramm is represented by Rayfield Allied worldwide.
  This biography is for information only and should not be reproduced.

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  • Rodelinda, Early Opera Company
    2011

    Gillian Ramm’s Rodelinda verged on the unhinged, so that her son Flavio…was not only witness to the violence of the tormentors but became a pawn in his mother’s knife-crazed desperation. The casting was uniformly strong: Ramm’s Rodelinda and James Laing’s Bertarido made a noble pair.

    Rian Evans, Opera

  • Vitellia (La clemenza di Tito), English Touring Opera
    (2011)

    Gillian Ramm…was fearless at the top and moving in her moment of truth and remorse, the great rondo with basset clarinet solo, Non più di fiori

    Hugh Canning, Opera

    Gillian Ramm kicked the thing off well as the dreadful Vitellia, quickly establishing the character

    Robert Thicknesse, Opera Now

    Gillian Ramm [is a] strongly focused Vitellia...the sobriety of the shamed Vitellia’s Non più di fiori (No bridal garlands), with rose petals drifting out of her packed linen, is superbly done

    Hilary Finch,The Times

    Ramm’s soprano firing bold top-note volleys that match her would-be trophy wife attitude and power-dressing

    George Hall,The Guardian

    The soprano Gillian Ramm is strong as the vengeful Vitellia

    John Allison,The Telegraph

    Ramm has a voice which has previously been likened to double cream and she did not disappoint vocally in what is a new role for her. She has a great richness of tone in her lower register and yet hits all her high notes perfectly on pitch and with relative ease', 'a confident musician', 'Ramm’s scene where she decides to admit to Tito she is the author of the assassination plot was poignant

    Miranda Jackson, Opera Britannia

  • Tytania (A Midsummer Night’s Dream), English Touring Opera
    (2010)

    …Gillian Ramm was in full and splendid voice as Tytania. She brought a sense of danger to the role, made her striking presence felt and soared above the orchestra in al those crucial places where Britten gives his queen of the fairies her head. (…) this was a fine singing and acting performance by Ramm, who showed once again that she is a considerable stage creature.

    Mike Reynolds, Musical Criticism

    As his wife, Gillian Ramm proved fully equal to the demands of Tytania’s fiendishly high register. Ms. Ramm’s voice was ravishing (…). Even at the gleaming top notes of her range, she sang with strength and security.

    John E.De Wald, Opera Britannia

    As the fairy queen, Gillian Ramm’s bright voice shone, matching the shimmers of her silvery gown. The brilliance of her upper range pierced like a moon beam through the night sky, and it was no wonder that the beauty of her chain of falling thirds, ‘Oh how I love thee’, won the ass-headed Bottom’s heart.

    Claire Seymour, Opera Today

    The fairy queen Tytania is brightly sung by Gillian Ramm

    Richard Fairman, Financial Times

    …the diamond strength of Gillian Ramm’s excellent Tytania.

    Hilary Finch, The Times

    Gillian Ramm’s Amazonian Tytania…

    Rupert Christiansen. The Telegraph

  • Fiordiligi (Così fan tutte), Glyndebourne on Tour
    (October 2009)

    Gillian Ramm's rapturous Fiordiligi

    Tim Ashley, The Guardian

    Gillian Ramm is a fine Fiordiligi

    John Allison, Opera

    Soprano Gillian Ramm was a clear, bell-like and enchantingly direct Fiordiligi.

    Susan King, Mid Sussex Times

• Gillian Ramm’s Operatic Repertoire

  Auber

  • Fra Diavolo (Zerline)

  Bellini

  • La Sonnambula (Amina)
  • I Capuleti e i Montecchi (Giulietta)

  Berg

  • Lulu (Lulu)

  Berlioz

  • Beatrice et Benedict (Hero)
  • Benvenuto Cellini (Teresa)

  Bizet

  • The Pearlfishers (Leila)

  Britten

  • A Midsummer Night's Dream (Tytania)
  • Turn of the Screw (Governess)
  • A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Helena)
  • Peter Grimes (First Niece, Second Niece)

  Donizetti

  • Lucia di Lammermoor (Lucia)
  • Don Pasquale (Norina)
  • L'elisir d'amore (Adina)

  Floyd

  • Susannah (Susannah)

  Gilbert & Sullivan

  • Patience (Patience)
  • The Mikado (Yum Yum)

  Gounod

  • Romeo et Juliette (Juliette)

  Gluck

  • Orfeo e Eurydice (Eurydice)

  Handel

  • Alcina (Oberto)
  • Aci, Galatea e Polifemo (Aci)
  • Agrippina (Poppea)
  • Giulio Cesare (Cleopatra)
  • Alcina (Alcina)
  • Orlando (Dorinda)
  • Rodelinda (Rodelinda)
  • Semele (Semele)

  A. Hopkins

  • Three’s Company (Miss Honey)

  Lehàr

  • The Merry Widow (Valencienne)

  Monteverdi

  • I Combattimenti di Tancredi e Clorinda (Clorinda)

  Mozart

  • Così fan Tutte (Fiordiligi)
  • Le Nozze di Figaro (Barbarina)

  Pergolesi

  • La Serva Padrona (Serpina)

  Rossini

  • La Cenerentola (Clorinda)

  Strauss

  • Die Fledermaus (Rosalinde)

  Stravinsky

  • The Rake’s Progress (Anne Truelove)

  Verdi

  • Il Trovatore (Inez)

  Gillian Ramm’s Concert Repertoire

  Bach

  • St John Passion
  • Magnificat in D
  • St Matthew Passion
  • Christmas Oratorio

  Berg

  • Sieben Früher Lieder

  Britten

  • On this Island

  Brahms

  • Requiem

  Debussy

  • Ariettes Oubliées

  Grieg

  • Sechs Lieder Op 38

  Handel

  • Messiah
  • Ode to Saint Cecilia
  • Saul
  • Solomon
  • Samson
  • Crudel Tiranno Amor

  Haydn

  • The Creation
  • The Seasons
  • Nelson Mass

  Mahler

  • Symphony No. 4
  • Das Klagende Lied

  Mozart

  • Requiem
  • Coronation Mass in C Major
  • Great Mass in C minor
  • Voi Avete un Cor Fedele
  • Schon lacht der holde frühling

  Orff

  • Carmina Burana

  Pergolesi

  • Stabat Mater

  Rossini

  • Petite Messe

  Schumann

  • Liederkreis Op 39 Eichendorff

  Strauss

  • Frühlingstimmen Waltz

  Vaughan Williams

  • Sea Symphony

• Photos

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    Photographer: Melissa Carpenter

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  • 
    Photographer: Melissa Carpenter

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  • 
    Photographer: Melissa Carpenter

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  • 
    Photographer: Melissa Carpenter

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  • 
    Photographer: Melissa Carpenter

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