woman with eyeglasses
Office
Mahaney Arts Center
Email
christen@middlebury.edu

Carol Christensen (MM University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, BME University of Wisconsin-Madison) has sung with numerous oratorio societies and opera companies throughout the country, including three years touring with the National Opera Company, ​as well as having appeared as a soloist with the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra.  She performed in the world premiere of Penderecki’s Paradise Lost at Chicago Lyric Opera, at La Scala in Milan, and at the Vatican.  She has been a First Place Winner of the Wisconsin NATSAA Auditions, and a finalist in the Wisconsin MET Auditions and the International Opera Auditions.

Ms. Christensen has a keen interest in singing contemporary music and has premiered and/or made demo recordings of works by composers Su Lian Tan, Daron Hagan, and Thomas Geoghegan. A vocal pedagogy enthusiast, Ms. Christensen is a member of the National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS), and has participated in master classes with, among others, classical artists Richard Miller, Dalton Baldwin, and Costanza Cuccaro; and Broadway pedagogs Robert Edwin, Bill Reed, and Neil Semer.  Although often seen in classical venues, Ms. Christensen also enjoys the popular side of singing, as well as composing in this genre.  Her seven incidental songs for female vocal trio and piano written for Caryl Churchill’s play, VINEGAR TOM, with lyrics by the author, were debuted in 2013 with the Middlebury College Theatre Department’s production of the play, and were performed Off-Broadway in PTY/NYC’s production at the Atlantic Stage 2 ​during the company’s summer season in 2015.  New York critics hailed her work as “haunting,” “sultry,” “wonderfully disturbing,” “the highlight of the evening.”

From 1999 to 2001 Ms. Christensen served as Governor of the Vermont NATS Association; her students have won or placed in various NATS competitions.  Current and former students have performed on Broadway and Off-Broadway, as well as at the College Light Opera Company, Tri-Cities Opera, Seagle Music Colony, The Opera Company of Middlebury, Texas Family Musicals, Clear Space Theatre, NYC’s ​Ellen’s Stardust Diner, The Flynn Theatre, ​and others.  Her students have been accepted for graduate studies at NYU, The University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, The Crane School of Music, The University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Westminster Choir College, among others.  Formerly a member of the American Guild of Musical Artists, and Actors Equity, Ms. Christensen is a founding member of the Opera Company of Middlebury, and has been a member of the Middlebury College Applied Music Faculty since 1991, where along with teaching voice she serves as Musical Director for the annual Music Department/Town Hall Theater J-term musical.