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Praised as “luscious,” “amber-toned,” and “dazzling” by Opera News, American mezzo-soprano Samantha Hankey is quickly establishing a name for herself both at home and abroad. In the 2018/19 season, Samantha will make her Metropolitan Opera debut as Pantalis inMefistofele, and returns to the Met throughout the year in Adriana Lecouvreur, Carmen, Das Rheingold, Götterdämmerung, and Rigoletto. She will also make her company debut at Opernhaus Zürich as Cherubino in Le nozze di Figaro. In addition to these debuts, Samantha will cover the title role in the premiere of Nico Muhly’sMarnie at the Metropolitan Opera.
Samantha’s 2017/18 engagements included important role debuts as both Rosina in Il barbiere di Siviglia (Den Norske Opera) and Siébel in Faust (Grand Théâtre de Genève). As a member of San Francisco Opera’s prestigious Merola Opera Program, Samantha sang the role of Angelina in La Cenerentola to enthusiastic critical acclaim, with the SF Gate praising her performance as “dark-hued, confident…formidable.” Equally at home in classic repertoire and new music, Samantha took part in two significant workshops last season: Ricky Ian Gordon’s Intimate Apparel, in association with the Metropolitan Opera and Lincoln Center Theatre, and David Hertzberg’s The Wake World, commissioned for Opera Philadelphia. Samantha enjoys a close collaboration with composer David Hertzberg and was instrumental in developing the title role of his opera The Rose Elf, which was written for her, and which she will premiere in New York at the end of this season.
Samantha’s growing career includes awards in a vast number of national and international competitions. In 2018, she won both First Prize and the Media Prize at the Inaugural Glyndebourne Cup. The Arts Desk wrote of her victory: “Polished, golden of tone, and convincing…. She has a natural charisma, centering on the voice itself…allowing her unfailing musicality to shine through.” In 2018, Samantha also received a Career Grant from the Richard Tucker Music Foundation, following an earlier 2016 award of a Sara Tucker Study Grant. In 2017, she was named a Grand Finals Winner by the Metropolitan Opera National Council, took First Prize in the Dallas Opera Guild Vocal Competition, and received a Leonore Annenberg Arts Fellowship in that foundation’s final year.
In addition to her stage performances, Samantha is an accomplished recital and concert artist. In 2017, she made her Carnegie Hall debut in Handel’s Messiah with Musica Sacra and performed Rossini’s Stabat Mater in North Carolina. Prior to that, Samantha was heard at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall in “Juilliard Songfest: Songs of Richard Strauss,” curated by Brian Zeger, as well as a program of Liszt, Schumann, and Strauss songs that she presented as winner of the Vocal Arts Honors Recital. Her voice has also been heard on the radio, including broadcasts from PlayRTS, BR-Klassik, WQXR, and NPR. In 2012, Samantha was featured in HBO’s documentary A YoungArts Master Class with renowned soprano Renée Fleming.
A native of Marshfield, Massachusetts, Samantha embraced her passion for music from an early age after performing in a local production of Annie at age six. She sang with the Boston Children’s Chorus for several years as a youth, attended the distinguished Walnut Hill School for the Arts, and pursued pre-college vocal training at the Longy School of Music and the New England Conservatory. In April 2018, Samantha was thrilled to return to her roots with Boston Children’s Chorus by joining them at Carnegie Hall for their 15th anniversary concert.
Samantha is passionate about using her music to support philanthropic causes, and in her free time, gladly volunteers to appear in charity recitals that raise awareness for the Voices of Hope, Parkinson’s research, and more.