ABBA

Soprano from Chagrin Falls, Ohio, who attended the Cleveland Institute of Music and did her postgraduate work at the University of Southern California. This afforded her opportunities to perform Gilbert & Sullivan in tandem with the L.A. Philharmonic and light up the stage at the Hollywood Bowl.

She went on to play a variety of roles as a member of the Opera Company of Philadelphia, including a Danish lady and newspaper seller in Benjamin Britten’s Death in Venice, Kate Pinkerton in Giacomo Puccini’s Madama Butterfly, and Xenia in Modest Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov.

On 28^th April 1989, she performed at a benefit for the Amercian Institute of Musical Studies in a program that featured music by Georges Bizet, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Franz Schubert, and Richard Strauss.

She also fared well in a handful of competitions, winning the Pavarotti competition, tying for second place in the Montreal International Music Competition, and showing at the Baltimore Opera International Vocal Competition.

On 12^th February 1990, she performed the role of Dalinda in George Frideric Handel’s Ariodante. A couple of months later, she was the featured soprano in a performance of Handel’s Messiah with the Milwaukee Symphony Chorus. In 1991, she was in a production of Mozart’s The Abduction of the Seraglio at the Buxton Opera Festival and Canterbury Opera Festival.

She went solo on 19^th March 1993 in an evening of arias and songs by composers ranging from Barber to Berlioz at Albright College’s Meridian Theatre as a part of their Star series.

On 23^rd October, she sang the soprano bits of Mass for the Dead with the American Chamber Opera Company.

In the winter of 1996, she returned to relatively familiar territory, appearing as Polissena in Handel’s Radamisto at Opera de Marseille. On 6^th March 1998, she played Marguerite in the Dayton Opera’s production of Faust.

She relocated to Bonita Springs, Florida, in 2000, where she worked as a voice instructor at the First Presbyterian Church Community Music School. In 2001, she wed architect Samuel Vasquez and took his surname even though she is still popularly referred to as Steffanie Pearce. In April 2002, she graced the congregation at Vanderbilt Presbyterian Church with a free recital that showed off her versatile range, mixing in Broadway and film music, liturgical music, and opera.

Opera beckoned again in the fall of 2003, when she embodied Donna Anna in a Teatro Lirico D’Europa production of Mozart’s Don Giovanni. On 21^st November 2004, she played The Countess in the Orpheum Theater’s mounting of Giacomo Rossini’s La Cenerentola.

Then she gave the people of Naples, Florida, a gift. In the fall of 2005, she announced the genesis of Opera Naples, with whom she not only performs, but serves as Artistic Director. One of their first productions was Puccini’s Tosca, with Steffanie in the title role. Opera Naples continued to expand and purchased a 25-unit building in which to house their administrative and educational efforts, as well as providing a rehearsal hall. In 2008, she starred in another Opera Naples event, “Opera Stars under the Stars”, which was held at Cambier Park. Opera Naples has become a fixture in Floridian culture and musical education, and also operates The Opera Naples Teen Summer Performing Camp, which has attacked ambitious projects such as Gilbert & Sullivan’s H.M.S. Pinafore.

In 2009, Steffanie began an even more enormous undertaking: Motherhood. Do you think she loves opera? She named her daughter Aria.

The Philadelphia Singers recordings

Adeste Fidelis (Frederick Oakeley/John Francis Wade)

RCA 6559-2-RC (Gloria! Gloria!)

Soprano – Benita Valente

The Concerto Soloists Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia

Conductor: Michael Korn

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