Soprano Sonja Krenek is a passionate and emotionally expressive performer described as a “powerful sumptuous soprano with a nice ‘dark’ quality.” In 2018, Ms. Krenek sang with Winter Opera St. Louis as Leïla in Les pêcheurs des perles. The summer of 2016 marked her debut as Mimì in La bohème with the Crested Butte Music Festival. She then reprised the role in October 2016 with The Colorado Symphony and will twice more reprise the role this year with Salt Marsh Opera and Barn Opera.
Ms. Krenek continues to do well in Opera Competitions around the country. In 2016 she was the Opera Division Grand Prize Winner at the Metropolitan International Music Festival Competition, the Third Prize recipient at the Gerda Lissner Foundation International Vocal Competition and a semi-finalist in the Loren L. Zachary International Vocal Competition. She is also the winner of encouragement awards from The Gerda Lissner Foundation in Opera ans well as their Lieder/Song Competition, The Giulio Gari International Voice Competition and the Opera at Florham Violetta DuPont Vocal Competition in 2015, the 2014 Second Place winner of the Peter Elvins Vocal Competition, the 2011 recipient of the Tony Cuevas Memorial Award from West Bay Opera’s Holt Competition, and the East Bay Opera League Competition Award winner in 2010. In 2012, she won the MetroWest Opera Young Artist Competition, and subsequently appeared with the company as Micaëla in Carmen.
Ms. Krenek has participated in Young Artist programs with Opera North, where she performed Greta Fiorentino in Street Scene and covered Violetta in La traviata in 2014, and Central City Opera, where she performed Monica in The Medium as a Bonfils-Stanton Studio Artist in 2012, and where she was the recipient of Central City Opera’s Yellow Rose Award for Most Outstanding Female Performer.
A dedicated concert artist, Ms. Krenek recently performed as the soprano soloist in Canciones y arias with the Lyric Unlimited, Lyric Opera of Chicago. In 2013, days after the Boston Marathon bombings, she had the honor of singing the soprano solo in a benefit concert of Brahms’ Requiem. Taking place at the MIT campus, the concert raised thousands of dollars for victims of the tragic event.
Ms. Krenek is a graduate of the Boston University Opera Institute, where she performed Mrs. Coyle in Owen Wingrave, Carolina in Il matrimonio segreto, Beatrice in Three Decembers, and produced, directed, and sang the leading role of Irena in The Seduction of a Lady as an independent project. She received a Bachelor of Music in Vocal Performance from the University of California, Irvine and a Master of Music degree in vocal performance from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, where she appeared as Anne Trulove in The Rake’s Progress, and was the winner of the vocal concerto competition performing Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915.
