Jennifer Aylmer, soprano

American soprano Jennifer Aylmer began her 2006-2007 season with her return to both the New York City Opera as Gretel in Hänsel und Gretel, and the Metropolitan Opera as Papagena in Die Zauberflöte. Other engagements for the season included Rosasharn in The Grapes of Wrath with Utah Opera, her debuts with the Phoenix Symphony as Gretel in concert performance of Hänsel und Gretel under the direction of Michael Christie, and with the San Diego Symphony in Mozart’s Exsultate, jubilate, Villa-Lobos’ Bachianas Brasileiras, and Mahler’s Symphony No. 4. Additional engagements include the title role in Rodelinda with Portland Opera, a return to the Met for a reprise of her Bella in An American Tragedy, and her Atlanta Opera debut as Gretel in Hänsel und Gretel.

Ms. Aylmer made her debut with the Metropolitan Opera in the 2005-2006 season as Bella in the world premiere of Tobias Picker’s An American Tragedy.  She then made her debuts with Utah Opera as Pamina in Die Zauberflöte, and as Rose Maurrant in Street Scene with Opera Theater of St. Louis, before concluding her season with Beethoven’s 9th Symphony with the Rochester Philharmonic, an all-Mozart concert with Pacific Symphony, and Fauré’s Requiem, with the Utah Symphony and Opera.

Ms. Aylmer has been a featured soloist with the National Symphony Orchestra, the New York Festival of Song, the Aspen Festival Orchestra, and the Beijing Music Festival. She sang Eurydice in Gluck's Orphée et Eurydice with the Oratorio Society of New York at Carnegie Hall, opposite Ewa Podles, and during the summer of 2005 made her San Francisco debut singing Bernstein’s Arias and Barcarolles with Michael Tilson Thomas.  Ms. Aylmer made her New York recital debut as the 2001 recipient of the Alice Tully Hall Vocal Arts Debut Recital from the Juilliard School, and has been presented across the country by the Marilyn Horne Foundation.

A native of Long Island, Ms. Aylmer is a graduate of the Eastman School of Music and an alumnus of the Juilliard Opera Center. Her many honors and awards include a Career Grant from the William Matheus Sullivan Foundation, the Richard F. Gold Career Grant, and an award from the National Society of Arts and Letters.  She has also received notable prizes from the Palm Beach Opera Competition, Opera Index, and the Oratorio Society of New York Competition. Previous NYFOS appearances: Latin Lovers (1999); Great American Songwriting Teams (1999); Songs of Sense and Sensibility (2000); Songbook for a New Century (2001); Spanish Gold (2001); Lyrics by Shakespeare (2002); The Crystal Anniversary Concert (2003); Homage to Barcelona (2004); Fats and Fields (2005).