Elizabeth Campbell

Verdi Spectacular, State Opera of South Australia

“…The wonderful mezzo-soprano, Elizabeth Campbell, stayed with Il Trovatore in the role of Azucena, with a remarkable version of Condotta ell'era in ceppi”.

Barry Lenny, broadwayworld.com, 21 November 2017

Amneris, Aida, State Opera of South Australia,

“Elizabeth Campbell’s glowing but hard-edged voice synthesized with her noble but all-to-human jealousy of Aida, creating a totally credible character who inspired sympathy as well as hatred.”

Elizabeth Silsbury, Opera Magazine, January 2011

La Sonnambula, Opera Australia

“Elizabeth Campbell impressed as the mill owner Teresa, who raised the orphaned Amina. Her voice remains rich and secure and her warm characterisation was deeply touching.”

The Australian, 3 May 2010

Elegies song cycle by William Finn (State Opera Studio)

“Elizabeth Campbell brings to her songs the intelligence and commitment she devotes to her operatic repertoire and projects emotional depth.”

Ewart Shaw, The Advertiser, 2 December 2008

L’Incoronazione di Poppea, Monteverdi

“Elizabeth Campbell sang Arnalta radiantly beautifully, in particular the deeply touching lullaby to her mistress, Poppea.”

Peter Burch, The Australian, 22 July 2008

Elizabeth Campbell, one of Australia’s most distinguished mezzo-sopranos, is a graduate of the Sydney Conservatorium of Music and was awarded a Music Students Overseas Study Foundation Scholarship and an Australian Musical Foundation grant for study in London and Europe. She was a finalist in the Munich International Competition, winner of the Elly Ameling Lieder Prize in the ‘s-HertogenboschSinging Competition and has represented Australia in the Singer of the World Competition in Cardiff. In 1997 she was awarded the Bayreuth Scholarship.

In recent seasons she has been heard in Songs of a Wayfarer (Mahler) with the Adelaide Hills Chamber Players, A Child of our Time (Tippett) for Adelaide Festival, Mrs Sedley, one of her signature roles, in Peter Grimes with Sydney Symphony Orchestra, David Robertson conducting, (which she was also scheduled to perform with Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra); Mrs. Grose (Turn of the Screw), Emma in Summer of the Seventeenth Doll, Christina in Christina’s World and Katisha in The Mikado, all with State Opera South Australia, and Mother in Hansel and Gretel with Melbourne Symphony Orchestra. Her recital and concert engagements have included the world première performance of a new work by Andrew Ford, The Blessing, at Coriole Festival, a recital in Adelaide, a return to the Astra Ensemble, Melbourne and an appearance at Melbourne Recital Centre.

Elizabeth made her operatic debut as Carmen with the West Australian Opera and since then has featured regularly with the state opera companies and Opera Australia. Her extensive operatic repertoire includes leading roles in Così fan tutte, Eugene Onegin, Carmen, Xerxes, Giulio Cesare, Alcina, The Marriage of Figaro, La clemenza di Tito, Boris Godunov, The Rake’s Progress, Il trittico, Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg, Les Troyens, Les contes d’Hoffmann, Werther, Hansel and Gretel, La forza del destino, Il trovatore, Nabucco, Madama Butterfly (for which she was twice awarded the Green Room Award), Lulu, Peter Grimes, Die Fledermaus, L’incoronazione di Poppea, The Ring Cycle, Capriccio, Rigoletto, Andréa Chénier, The Turn of the Screw, Little Women, Dead Man Walking (for which she won a Helpmann Award) and the world premières of Summer of the Seventeenth Doll, Batavia, Lindy and The Love of the Nightingale (Richard Mills).

More recently Elizabeth has been heard in the roles of The Sorceress in Dido and Aeneas, Amneris in Aida, Niobe/Nurse/Narrator in The Love of the Nightingale, Maddalena in Rigoletto, Teresa in La Sonnambula, Mrs Sedley in Peter Grimes, and Grimgerde in Die Walküre and First Norn in Götterdämmerung, all for Opera Australia; Public Opinion in Orpheus in the Underworld, Herodias in Salome and Amneris (for which she won a Helpmann Award) for State Opera of South Australia; her role debut as Klytemnestra in Elektra, Azucena in Il trovatore and Mrs Sedley in Peter Grimes for West Australian Opera; and Fricka in Das Rheingold for Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra.  In addition to recitals in South Australia and Victoria her performances have included Elijah as well as returns to State Opera of South Australia for semi-staged versions of La Vida Breve and Gianni Schicchi and the Verdi Spectacular.

One of Australia’s leading concert artists and recitalists, Elizabeth appears regularly with leading Australian symphony orchestras, choirs and festivals and has a wide repertoire which includes works by many contemporary Australian composers including Peter Sculthorpe, Richard Mills, Ross Edwards, Graeme Koehne and Andrew Ford. Internationally, she has performed Handel’s Messiah at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, toured the USA with the Sydney Symphony, and given recitals at the Wigmore Hall, in Den Haag and Antwerp.

Other concert engagements have included appearances as a special guest artist with the Adelaide Youth Orchestra in Elgar’s Sea Pictures, at the Woodend Festival, Beethoven’s Symphony No.9 with the Adelaide and West Australian Symphony Orchestras, Australian World Orchestra and Australian Youth Orchestra, Die Walküre with WASO, Handel’s Messiah with Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, performances at the Huntington Festival and Coriole Music Festival as featured vocalist, Verdi’s Requiem for State Opera of South Australia, and the world première performances of Richard Mills’ Passion according to St Mark for the Tasmanian, West Australian and Queensland Symphony Orchestras.

Elizabeth’s recordings include Banquo’s Buried (Vol.1 of the Anthology of Australian Song Series) for 2MBS, Mahler’s Symphony No.2, Elgar’s Sea Pictures, Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis and Symphony No.9, Graeme Koehne’s Three Poems by Byron, Handel’s Messiah, The Australian Opera’s Giulio Cesare, Summer of the Seventeenth Doll, Margaret Sutherland’s The Woman and the Child, Woman’s Song, Australian settings of Judith Wright poems, and State Opera of South Australia’s Ring cycle.

Elizabeth Campbell is managed by Graham Pushee: graham@artsmanagement.com.au
  February 2023
  This biography is for general information purposes only and not for publication.
Please contact Graham for an up-to-date biography to suit your needs.