Jennifer Johnson Cano

Mezzo-soprano Jennifer Johnson Cano is recognized for her naturally lustrous sound as well as a fresh and appealing presence on symphonic, operatic and recital stages. A 2011 Sara Tucker Study Grant Recipient, Ms. Cano joined The Lindemann Young Artist Development Program at The Metropolitan Opera in 2008 and made her Metropolitan Opera debut in 2009-2010 singing a Bridesmaid in Le nozze di Figaro and Sandman in Hansel and Gretel. This season she bowed as Wellgunde in the Met’s new production of Das Rheingold and performed Ludmilla in The Metropolitan Opera and The Juilliard School’s joint production of The Bartered Bride conducted by James Levine. As First Prize winner of the 2009 Young Concert Artist International Auditions, she has already given stunning recital debuts in both New York City at Merkin Hall and Washington, D.C. at the Kennedy Center. “Ms. Johnson Cano is effortlessly likable, but in both her voice and her manner there is also a hint of something steely, even intimidating. Character — individuality, a taste for risk — is the attribute some find lacking in young American singers, but Ms. Johnson Cano has it: an honesty and assurance so impressive that you want to call it bravery.” — The New York Times

Ms. Cano begins the 2011-2012 season with her third residency at the Marlboro Festival and in concert with the Metropolitan Opera’s summer recital series in Central Park and Brooklyn Bridge Park. She appears at The Hollywood Bowl with Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 and Choral Fantasy, returns to the New York Philharmonic for Mozart’s Mass in C Minor with Alan Gilbert and sings Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 with the World Doctors Orchestra in Washington DC. In September she will perform Schoenberg’s arrangement of Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s and tenor Paul Groves conducted by George Manahan. She returns to the Met as Wellgunde in Das Rheingold and Götterdammerung, Sandman in Hansel and Gretel and Kate Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly. She takes part in Carnegie Hall’s Neighborhood Concert Series in recital with pianist Christopher Cano and will sing a concert of Mozart arias at the Mecklenburg Festival. In May Jennifer Johnson Cano also makes her Carnegie Hall debut with Franz Welser-Möst and the Cleveland Orchestra in a concert performance of Strauss’ Salome.

Ms. Cano made her debut with the Chicago Opera Theater as Kate Julian in Benjamin Britten’s Owen Wingrave in 2009. In 2011 she returned to Chicago to perform Schumann’s Frauenliebe und Leben as part of the company’s new production He/She. “Jennifer Johnson Cano brought a sincerity and emotional depth to these beautiful songs that made the texts’ occasional excesses seem completely irrelevant. With a rich voice, ease of technique and expressive delicacy, Cano conveyed the varied elements of Schumann’s cycle from the rapt wonder of Du Ring an meinem Finger to the excited joy of her impending marriage (Helft mir, Ihr Schwestern) and the rush of maternal joy in An meinem Herzen, an meiner Brust.” — Chicago Classical Review. After two seasons as a Gerdine Young Artist with Opera theatre of St. Louis, Ms. Cano made her principal artist debut in 2008 as The Muse/Nicklausse in Offenbach’s The Tales of Hoffman.

As a Young Concert Artist winner, she was awarded the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festival and Princeton University Prizes and gave recitals throughout the United States, including Boston, Philadelphia, Houston and Chicago. She toured with Musicians from Marlboro singing Respighi’s Il Tramonto and Cuckson’s Der gayst funem shturem that were recorded and made available on CD. She has been part of the Ravinia Festival’s Steans Institute received a 2009 Sullivan Foundation Award.

Jennifer Johnson Cano is a native of St. Louis, Missouri and obtained her bachelor’s degree in Music from Webster University in St. Louis and her master’s degree from Rice University in Houston, Texas. She currently resides in New York City.