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Soprano who attended
The Academy of Vocal Arts, Temple University and Westminster Choir College
and has amassed an impressive list of credits, singing in a variety of
venues and seemingly every sub-genre of classical music, including art
songs, chamber music, opera, and oratorios.
Her operatic
adventures have taken her to the Michigan Opera Theater, New York City
Opera, Opera Ebony, Philadelphia Opera Company, and Rio de Janeiro’s Teatro Municipal.
Orchestras
with which she has worked include The Charlotte Symphony, The National
Symphony, The Philly Pops Orchestra, and The Piedmont Triad Symphony.
As a soloist,
she has performed with The American Ballet Company, The Cathedral Choral
Society, The Choral Arts Society of Philadelphia, The New York Choral
Society, The Oratorio Society, The Philadelphia Singers, and Princeton Pro Musica.
In 1987, she
appeared on The Philadelphia Singers’ Christmas album, Gloria! Gloria!. She performed with the New York
Choral Society and Shanghai Broadcasting Symphony in 2002 in a concert
presentation of Porgy and Bess. Other highlights featured stops at
The Kennedy Center, Carnegie Hall, and international dates in Brazil,
China, and France.
On 1st
February 2009, she lent her vocal talents to “Three Sopranos: An African American Experience”,
a mix of classical and sacred music, as part of Fordham Church’s
Fordham at Four series. Marilyn
covered similar territory in 2010 in a program entitled “From
Spiritual to Art Song” with keyboardist Darya Gabay
in Washington, D.C., and was a featured soprano in a performance with the
Choir of the Church of Immaculate Conception In the winter of 2010, she
played Monisha in a production of Scott Joplin’s
Treemonisha
at the Atlas Performing Arts Center.
In the field
of education, she also teaches voice at the Levine School of Music.
The Philadelphia Singers recordings
Adeste
Fidelis (Frederick Oakeley/John Francis Wade)
RCA 6559-2-RC
(Gloria! Gloria!)
Soprano – Benita Valente
Concerto
Soloists Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia
Conductor – Michael Korn
Sources:
- http://www.cttrust.org/2053?highlight=masterpiece
- http://www.levineschool.org/site/PageServer?pagename=about_facultybios
- http://fromspiritualtoartsong.eventbrite.com/
- http://www.fordhamumc.org/events.aspx
- http://www.concertonet.com/scripts/review.php?ID_review=6342
- http://www.immaculateconceptionchurchdc.org/music.php
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