About Suzanne

Said to be “a wonderful artist“ with a “velvety and smooth“ voice, and a “lovely, burnished sound,“ Suzanne Fatta is an Italian-American contralto living in York, England, where she is pursuing a PhD in historical performance practice. She has been praised highly for her very expansive range, and can sing anywhere from Bass I to Soprano II; she performs professionally as a Bass in the famous 'Vivaldi's Women' choir (Schola Pietatis Antonio Vivaldi, SPAV), as seen on the BBC and Sky Arts TV. While Ms. Fatta specializes in musical performance of the 16th and 17th centuries, her secondary fields include ethnomusicology, ritual studies, 20th/21st century music, gender studies, Buddhism, and Medieval history. Likewise, her performance and research interests range from the Medieval, Renaissance, Baroque and Classical eras through 21st century new music and folk musics of the world. Suzanne is researching lower women's voices, and teaches voice lessons to female tenors and basses.

Suzanne is a founding member, with her partner, of Trinacria Productions, collaborating across the arts. Since September 2009, she can be seen in a documentary about the music of Venice, on Sky Arts TV. In October 2009, she gave the world-premiere of a song in Malta, called “enthrall[ing and] intriguing“ in the local press. Suzanne's 2008 performance in Viriditas Opera's Ordo Virtutum was said to be a “rich, low solo -- it sounded fantastic and continental. Very unique and distinctive!“ by one of the top early musicians in England. Earlier in 2008, she performed 2 lead roles in the world-premiere of Jon Hughes' opera Antigone, also with Viriditas Opera; her performance was hailed as “magnificent,“ “brilliant,“ and “wonderful - astonishingly good acting!“ Suzanne also enjoys straight drama, and recently portrayed John the Apostle in the 2010 York Mystery Plays. Ms. Fatta is particularly gifted at performing in the Victorian burlesque style.

Ms. Fatta is currently collaborating with composer Emily Kalies on a theatrical work, Reflection noitcelfeR, based on 'The Pillow Book' and other diaries by women - she premiered the one-woman piece (complete with pre-recorded audio and video) in the early 2010 season, and will give the Irish premiere in December 2010. Other forthcoming collaborations include an operatic drama with composer Morag Galloway, and FL Dunkin Wedd is composing for Suzanne's female trio Juniper; Ms. Fatta is the co-founder of Juniper, which experiments with repertoire from across the Western canon. Previously, Suzanne sang professionally with the Buffalo Philharmonic Chorus & Chamber Singers, serving as the Alto section leader.

While in Buffalo, she was an Adjunct professor of Music and Religion at Canisius College. Prior to that, she was a Teaching Fellow in the Harvard Music department, winning a university-wide teaching award of excellence. She has also been a Teaching Assistant, Research Assistant and Tutor at Oberlin, Eastman and York. Ms. Fatta works as a research, copy, teaching, personal and editorial assistant, as well as a translator, web designer, freelance editor, writing tutor and journal peer reviewer, and currently sits on the Council of the Royal Musical Association. Ms. Fatta is the US Representative on the Board of SPAV. In 2008, Suzanne began working for Art Monastery Project, an artists' collaborative community in Umbria, Italy.

Suzanne has studied Italian, Spanish, German, French and Latin with a little Greek, Portuguese and Sanskrit thrown in for fun. She has also sung in Old & Middle English, Hebrew, Friûlan, Swedish, Norwegian, Icelandic, Finnish, Russian, old Church Slavonic, Provençal, and Catalan. Suzanne has performed in top venues in the US, England, Scotland, France, Malta, Italy, Germany, and the Czech Republic. Some favorite pieces include Monteverdi Vespers 1610, Bartok Music for Strings, Percussion and Celeste, Berg Wozzeck, Messiaen Quatour pour la fin du temps, Tallis Lamentations of Jeremiah, and most of Byrd's Gradualia.

Lead operatic roles include Testo (tenor) in Monteverdi Il Combattimento di Tancredi & Clorinda, Mary Magdalene in various Medieval music-dramas, Celestial Love (alto) in Hildegard Ordo Virtutum, Sancho Panza (baritone) in Boismortier Don Quichotte chez la Duchesse and Telemann Don Quichotte auf der Hochzeit des Comacho, Hilarion (pants part) in W. S. Gilbert The Princess, and the title characters (mezzo) in scenes from Carmen, and Dido & Aeneas. Forthcoming performances in the 2010/11 season include Pierrot Lunaire in Rome, Monteverdi Vespers in Venice, and a reprisal of Sensorium in Dublin.

In world-premiere events, she originated the lead role of The Emperor (tenor) in Hilary Nicholls The Emperor's New Clothes, Isemene and Eurydice (mezzo, alto) in Jon Hughes Antigone, FL Dunkin Wedd's song "Ultime mie speranze" (bass-baritone) which was commissioned by and dedicated to Ms. Fatta, and the solo performer in Emily Kalies noitcelfeRRelfection. Other recent performances include the Tenor solos from Monteverdi Vespers performed with Javanese gamelan at the Hall of Harmonies concert in early 2010.

Ms. Fatta has sung the Soprano solos in Brahms Neue Liebeslieder, Carissimi Usquequo peccatores, Schütz Musicalische Exequien, Vaughan Williams Mass in G Minor, Carissimi Jepthe, and Barber Hermit Songs: she has also sung the Alto solos in Mazzocchi Lamento di David, and Handel Messiah.

She can be heard on the DVD and CD Vivaldi - Gloria by Schola Pietatis Antonio Vivaldi (Vivaldi's Women), which is available on iTunes, from distributors across the UK, and directly from www.spav.co.uk, made by Colonial Pictures for Sky Arts. Suzanne will also feature as a soloist on the forthcoming CD of Medieval music-dramas produced by David Rose and Viriditas Opera.