Recognised as one of the leading lyric sopranos of her generation, Sophie Bevan was made an MBE for services to music in the Queen’s Birthday Honours in 2019.
Sought after for her work in opera, Sophie’s engagements include Susanna (Le nozze di Figaro), Ilia (Idomeneo), Pamina (Die Zauberflöte) and Dalinda (Ariodante) for the Royal Ballet & Opera; Ellen Orford (Peter Grimes) for the Teatro dell’Opera in Rome; Beatriz in Thomas Adès’ The Exterminating Angel at the Salzburg Festival, Royal Ballet & Opera and Metropolitan Opera; Freia (Das Rheingold) and Pamina at the Teatro Real in Madrid; Mélisande (Pelléas et Mélisande) for Semperoper Dresden and at the Aldeburgh Festival; Michal (Saul) for the Glyndebourne Festival; Governess (The Turn of the Screw) for Garsington Opera and Fiordiligi (Così fan tutte) for Welsh National Opera. Her many roles for the English National Opera include Hermione in Ryan Wigglesworth’s The Winter’s Tale, Micaëla (Carmen); Penelope (Gloriana); Télaïre (Castor and Pollux), Messiah and The Seven Deaths of Maria Callas.
She works regularly with leading orchestras worldwide and with conductors including Sir Antonio Pappano, Daniel Harding, Andris Nelsons, Edward Gardner, Laurence Cummings, Sir Mark Elder, Ivor Bolton and Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla. Recent highlights include Beethoven's Ah! Perfido, Haydn's Die Jahreszeiten, Oliver Knussen's Whitman Settings and Ryan Wigglesworth’s Augenlieder all with the London Philharmonic Orchestra; Strauss’ Vier letzte Lieder with the Philharmonia Orchestra; Britten's Les Illuminations with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, the Aurora Orchestra and the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra; Fauré's Requiem and Haydn's Nelson Mass with the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra; Bach's Matthäuspassion with the Royal Concertgebouworkest; Handel's Messiah with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment; Mahler's Symphony No. 4 with the Hallé Orchestra and Mélisande in concert performances of Pélleas et Mélisande with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra. She has also appeared at the BBC Proms and the Aldeburgh, Edinburgh and Tanglewood Festivals.
An acclaimed recitalist, she has appeared with pianists including Julius Drake, Malcom Martineau, Ryan Wigglesworth, Christopher Glynn and Graham Johnson at venues including Wigmore Hall, Het Concertgebouw and the Aldeburgh and Oxford International Song Festivals.
Sophie studied at the Royal College of Music where she was awarded the Queen Mother Rose Bowl for excellence in performance. She was the recipient of the 2010 Critics’ Circle award for Exceptional Young Talent, The Times Breakthrough Award at the 2012 South Bank Sky Arts Awards, and the Young Singer Award at the 2013 inaugural International Opera Awards. She lives in Oxfordshire with her husband, three children and two cocker spaniels.
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Shakespeare's Sisters
Brighton Festival, May 2026
"Brilliantly unexpected songs and prose give voice to the voiceless."
The Guardian
Pelléas et Mélisande (Mélisande)
BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, March 2026
“Sophie Bevan's portrayal of the enigmatic, mysterious woman whose allure divides brothers Golaud and Pelleas would have happily graced any full-staged production.”
The Herald
“Sophie Bevan sang the mysterious Mélisande with rich, lustrous beauty, bringing glowing vitality to a role that more often lies in the mezzo than the soprano range.”
The Times
Così fan Tutte (Fiordiligi)
Welsh National Opera, February 2024
“As Fiordiligi, Sophie Bevan’s singing is delectable, hardly faltering in this most demanding of operatic roles. At the top, her soprano floats with instrumental purity, there’s a gorgeous bloom to her middle range and she brings a real sense of her character’s emotional turmoil, her second big aria Per Pietà sung as quietly as is viable.”
The Guardian
“Sophie Bevan as Fiordiligi has such a resplendent voice: her arias remain a highlight, never too showy.”
Buzz Magazine
Ryan Wigglesworth’s Magnificat
BBC Symphony Orchestra, December 2023
“Sophie Bevan soar[es] serenely above the chorus, or intertwining with its female voices, before bringing this impressive piece to its quiet close over gently pulsing harp and celesta.”
The Guardian
“It was Bevan as Mary who imbued the setting as a whole with a reflective spirituality.”
Bachtrack
Ryan Wigglesworth’s Magnificat
Hallé, March 2023
“[Sophie Bevan] alternated passages of warm lyricism with a dramatic urgency that brought the expostulating virgin vividly to light.”
The Guardian
Mahler’s Symphony No. 4
Hallé, March 2023
“Bevan singing with utmost control and elegant timbre alongside character which was in turn playful and tender.”
Bachtrack
Ariodante (Dalinda)
Royal Opera House, November 2020
“Sophie Bevan, meanwhile, portrayed the naïve, ill-used Dalinda as a passionate young woman and employed her rich bank of vocal colours to great effect: fiery and furious in her showpiece aria 'Neghittosi or voi'; deeply affecting in her reconciliation duet with Lyon.”
Bachtrack
Orfeo ed Euridice (Euridice)
Edinburgh International Festival, August 2019
“Sophie Bevan was equally compelling as Euridice, her rich, powerful voice conveying the character’s grief. Hers and Davies’s duets in Act Three were both powerful and poignant, and Bevan’s departure from the stage on Euridice’s death was effective in its simplicity.”
The Herald
The Turn of the Screw (Governess)
Garsington Opera, July 2019
“Sophie Bevan sang exquisitely, with just enough power and excellent diction. Her Governess is far from a hysterical woman, but the horror of the situation freezes her, fainting or rooting her to the spot in the terrific confrontation between Quint and Jessel.”
Bachtrack
“Sophie Bevan’s Governess, delivered with impressive tonal range, convincingly leaves us in doubt as to the fertility of her imagination. In the final moments she enters the corrupted realm of the lake, perhaps taking her own life, a striking conception somewhat undermined by the sight of her walking out the other side.”
Evening Standard
Britten’s Les Illuminations
BBC Philharmonic, May 2019
“Between the Symphonies Sophie Bevan was the magnetic soprano in Britten’s Les illuminations, settings of Frenchman Rimbaud’s symbolist poetry made for Sophie Wyss in 1939. The opening ‘Fanfare’ (not brassy, Britten’s scoring is solely for strings) was incisive and pregnant enough to anticipate a distinguished reading – fulfilled over the whole – Bevan quite operatic for her initial gambit, agile and sensual later, with some vivid word-painting, light and shade, discriminating dynamics, and well-judged (articulate) tempos.”
Classical Source
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