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Program

Chesley Mok, piano

O del mio dolce ardor Christoph Willibald Gluck

(1714-1787)

Eloisa Lin, soprano

Prayer H. Leslie Adams

(b. 1932)

Garrick Chau, baritone

The Singer Michael Head

(1900-1976)

Amy Cai, soprano

CATHERINE COOK

American mezzo-soprano Catherine Cook has excelled in a wide range of roles with leading companies throughout the United States.  Of her performance as the title character in Tobias Picker’s Dolores Claiborne, Opera Today wrote that “to say that Ms. Cook was a revelation is an understatement, since she stamped the part as her own, and experienced a triumph for her sensational performance…Ms. Cook is possessed of a round mezzo tone of great beauty, admirable control and potent power in all ranges and at any volume.”

Ms. Cook was a participant of San Francisco Opera’s prestigious Adler Fellowship and Merola Opera Program.  She is a winner of the Metropolitan National Council Auditions as well as the Merola Chicago Regional Auditions Yoder Award.  Ms. Cook holds a Master of Music degree from Wichita State University and an Artist Diploma from the University of Cincinnati-College Conservatory of Music, where she won the Norman Treigle Award in their Corbett Competition.  She has received Outstanding Alumni awards from both Millikin University and Wichita State University.

Catherine Cook is a passionate educator and has been teaching voice for 20 years, both in her private studio and at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, where she has been on the Voice Faculty for 16 years and currently serves as Chair of the Voice Department, a position she has held for an aggregate of five years.  She also currently holds the Frederica von Stade Distinguished Chair in Voice.  Cook has also taught at the San Francisco Opera Center with the Adler Fellowship Program as a resident voice teacher.

Cook’s students have been featured in prestigious young artist programs and companies around the country, including San Francisco Opera, Santa Fe Opera, Central City Opera, Wolf Trap Opera, Saratoga Opera, Florida Grand Opera, Arizona Opera, Pensacola Opera, Portland Opera, Des Moines Opera, Opera San Jose, and Hawaii Opera Theater, among others.

In addition to her role as a full time professor at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Cook is also a sought after masterclass teacher and has taught at numerous universities and young artist programs.  She has taught at San Francisco Opera, Opera Colorado, Schmidt Vocal Arts, Classical Singer Convention, San Francisco Conservatory Preparatory School, California State University Stanislaus, Cal State Los Angeles, University of Nevada Las Vegas, San Jose State, and will be the voice teacher / artist in residence with Opera in the Ozarks in the summer of 2022.

Cook’s teaching is based in the bel canto method, and is focused on breath, vowel, and alignment.  She is committed to empowering her students to find their individual voice both technically and artistically.