About Jenny
American soprano Jenny Ribeiro enjoys using her "bright instrument and engaging personality" (Voce di meche, 2016) to delight audiences throughout the world. Growing up in a musical household, Jenny learned to read music at the same time she learned to read words and was trained as a classical pianist and clarinetist as well as a singer. After spending a few seasons as a professional musical theater actress in the Pacific Northwest, she moved to New York City with the clichéd suitcase and a dream, but after being hired as a chorister in Golijov’s Ainadamar in its Carnegie Hall debut with The Orchestra of St. Luke's, she fell back in love with classical music and ultimately switched her focus to opera.
This season, Jenny will be touring throughout the US in her recital tour "From the Hearts of Women" as well as singing the soprano solos in Beethoven's 9th Symphony with Elkhart County Symphony and Saint-Saëns Christmas Oratorio with The Hudson Chorale. She will also be appearing in Handel's Messiah with Grace United Methodist Church in Lansing, MI and was a semi-finalist at the Corsica Lirica International Opera Competition in Corsica, France. Other performances include concerts with Bremerton West Sound Symphony, premiers with University of Michigan's Concert Band and a musical theater cabaret concert at Michigan State University's Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB) Laboratory as part of their yearly concert series.
Jenny has been featured in performances with Bard Summerscape Theater, Dicapo Opera, Opera Noire of New York, Amore Opera, Regina Opera, Knickerbocker Chamber Orchestra, The Collegiate Chorale, New York Virtuoso Singers, Hudson Chorale, Altoona Symphony Orchestra and elsewhere. Early on, she performed many of the leading lyric coloratura/soubrette roles (Pamina, Susanna, Serpina, etc.) while also journeying into larger repertoire with Giulietta (Les contes d’Hoffman), Gretel (Hansel and Gretel), Elvira (The Song of Norway - Carnegie Hall solo debut), Nella (Gianni Schicchi) and Martha (God Bless Everyone - premier by Thomas Pasatieri). Jenny’s repertoire now includes large lyric and spinto soprano roles, including Donna Anna (Don Giovanni), Mimì (La bohème), Michaela (Carmen), and Elsa (Lohengrin). A frequent recitalist and interpreter of new music, Jenny has premiered works for many composers through Vox Novus and others. She also recorded Matt Frey's chamber opera One-Eleven Heavy released by Navona Records. Jenny’s oratorio performances include Vivaldi’s Gloria, Britten’s A Ceremony of Carols, Handel’s Messiah, Verdi’s Requiem, and Mozart’s Requiem with Reformed Church in Bronxville, Westchester Choral Society, New Jersey Oratorio Society, Danbury Concert Chorus and many others.
In 2021/22 Jenny finished her Masters’ degree at Michigan State University, where she performed the roles of Geraldine (A Hand of Bridge), Mother (L’enfant et les Sortileges) and Lady Billows (Albert Herring) as well as toured local schools with MSU's Vocal Outreach. She recieved Third Prize in the Medici International Music Competition and debuted 3 Wagnerian roles at once as Ortlinde, Wellgunde, and Waldvogel for Berlin Wagner Group's "Wagner's Ring in One Evening".
Jenny has also worked as an educator, producer, rehearsal pianist and conductor in venues throughout the United States. Her most recent project, Michigan Opera Outreach, is an arts education project that aims to bring participatory opera education to children in the greater Lansing area. Serving as Founder and Program Director as well as one of the Teaching Artists, Jenny has received funding for 3 schools this year with the promise of more to come. Michigan Opera Outreach is currently sponsored by Lansing Matinee Musicale.
Arielle Doneson Photography