WINSTON-SALEM – Voice students from high school through graduate school from across North Carolina will converge on the campus of the University of North Carolina School of the Arts (UNCSA) as it hosts the North Carolina Chapter of the National Association of Teachers of Singing (NC NATS) 2011 Spring Classical Auditions Weekend.

Approximately 450 high school, undergraduate, graduate and continuing education students and 50 teachers will participate in the two-day event on Friday and Saturday, Feb. 18 and 19, on the UNCSA campus, 1533 South Main St., Winston-Salem.

NATS auditions offer voice students from across the state the opportunity to perform and receive written feedback about their performances.  After a preliminary round singing for adjudicators, selected students will perform in two honors recitals: on Friday, Feb. 18, at 4 p.m. and Saturday, Feb. 19, at 3 p.m.

On Friday at 7 p.m., acclaimed voice teacher Elizabeth Daniels will conduct a master class for participants.

The master class and honors recitals are free and open to the public. All three events will be held in Watson Chamber Music Hall on the UNCSA campus. For more information, contact the School of Music at 336-770-3255.

Elizabeth “Liz” Daniels, M.M., B.A., maintains a large private voice studio in Silver Spring, Md., and is on the adjunct voice faculty at The Curtis Institute of Music and The Catholic University of America.  She also is a master voice teacher for the Washington National Opera Domingo-Cafritz Young Artist Program. Daniels chairs the Education Committee of the Vocal Arts Society of Washington, producing its “Art Song Discovery Recital Series” and Public School Outreach Programs, which promote live recital performances.  Her students have won or placed in many prestigious competitions including the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, the National Association of Teachers of Singing Artist Awards, Operalia, the Liederkranz Competition, Das Lied International Song Competition and the Seoul International Music Competition.  Many of her students have been accepted into opera apprentice programs including those of Des Moines Opera, Sarasota Opera, Opera North, the Washington National Opera Domingo-Cafritz and the Tanglewood and Aspen Music Festival summer programs.  Daniels enjoyed a distinguished career in opera, concert and recital in Chicago, New York and Washington, D.C., and studied singing for 30 years with the late, great Todd Duncan.

The University of North Carolina School of the Arts is the first state-supported, residential school of its kind in the nation. Established as the North Carolina School of the Arts by the N.C. General Assembly in 1963, UNCSA opened in Winston-Salem (“The City of Arts and Innovation”) in 1965 and became part of the University of North Carolina system in 1972. More than 1,100 students from high school through graduate school train for careers in the arts in five professional schools: Dance, Design and Production (including a Visual Arts Program), Drama, Filmmaking, and Music. UNCSA is the state’s only public arts conservatory, dedicated entirely to the professional training of talented students in the performing, visual and moving image arts. UNCSA is located at 1533 S. Main St., Winston-Salem. For more information, visit www.uncsa.edu.

 

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