| Biography | The English-born soprano, opera director and teacher, Lorna Marie Haywood, studied at the Royal College of Music in London, with Mary Parsons and Gordon Clinton, and at the Juilliard School of Music in New York, with Sergius Kagen and Beverley Johnson.
Haywwod made her debut at Juilliard as Katya Kabanova. She made her Covent Garden debut in 1966 in Die Zauberflöte and sang Jenufa in 1972. She sang with the English National Opera from 1970, notably in Leo Janácek's The Makropoulus Case and Katya Kabanova. In the USA her opera appearances include those with the Chicago Lyric Opera, the Boston Concert, the San Francisco Opera, the Dallas Civic, the Baltimore Lyric, and the Pacific Northwest Festival in Seattle, and the companies of New Orleans, Washington, D.C., San Diego, Forth Worth, Columbus, Toledo, Atlanta and Honolulu. In Europe she has sung frequently at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, the English National Opera, the Welsh National Opera, and the Scottish Opera.
Haywood made her American debut as soloist with Robert Shaw. She has sung with most of America's major symphony orchestras, including the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra and Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. Her orchestral and concert appearances in the UK include those with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Hallé Orchestra, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, and City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. Summer festival appearances include Blossom, Meadowbrook, Aspen, Tanglewood, Grant Park, Cincinnati, Glyndebourne, Aldeburgh, Edinburgh, and London's Promenade Concerts in the Royal Albert Hall. She sang with the Handel Society in Washington, D.C., the Music of the Baroque in Chicago, at the Baldwin-Wallace College Bach Festival (1998), and was soprano soloist with the Bach Aria Group for two years.
After an operatic career that took her to numerous opera companies, Lorna Haywood is now in demand as an opera director. Acclaimed as a superb singing actress throughout her career, she now receives similar accolades for her innovative and imaginative direction |