BIOGRAPHY

After performing for an ill singer on opening night in the title role of Handel’s Rodelinda at Portland Opera, Sharin Apostolou was lauded by the Oregonian for “her lovely, high, clear voice, and her coloratura -- the dazzlingly fast music that says "Don't mess with me" -- was exuberant…she covered the musical terrain without fear,” and by Crosscut Seattle for, “[taking] on an impossibly daunting role with fearless flair, unraveling a sweet lyric coloratura voice of real promise.”

Sharin Apostolou’s recent engagements have included her Asian debut with the Macao International Music Festival as Belinda in Dido and Aeneas, her Avery Fisher Hall debut in two concerts with the National Chorale: Handel’s Alexander’s Feast paired with Mozart’s Requiem, and Handel’s Messiah; a return to Portland Opera singing Le Feu, La Princesse and Le Rossignol in Ravel’s L‘enfant et les Sortilèges and as Nannetta in Utah Opera’s Falstaff, for which the Salt Lake City Weekly said “the clarity and elegance on her few solos was mesmerizing." In the 2011-2012 season, she sang Alinda in Giasone with Opera Omnia at Le Poisson Rouge, Susanna in an abridged version of Le nozze di Figaro as part of the Bryant Park Fall Festival, covered Fortuna in Il Sogno di Scipione with Gotham Chamber Opera, joined the Little Opera Theatre of NY for Alison in Holst's rarely heard The Wandering Scholar, sang her first Lauretta and Suor Genovieffa in Il trittico with Baltimore Concert Opera, and returned to the Caramoor Festival as Argene in Ciro in Babilonia.

Ms. Apostolou's engagements for the 2012-2013 season include Rosina in Il barbiere di Siviglia and Gilda in Rigoletto, both with Shreveport Opera; Norina in Don Pasquale with Wichita Grand Opera, a return to Portland Opera to sing Almirena in Rinaldo in a collaboration with the Portland Baroque Orchestra, and joins the Alpine Theatre Project for Yuletide Affair 9. This summer, Ms. Apostolou joins Glimmerglass Opera to sing Guenevere in the Young Artist performance of Lerner and Loewe's classic musical Camelot.

A frequent performer of early music, Ms. Apostolou sang the title role in Cavalli’s La Calisto with the Portland Opera and the Portland Baroque Orchestra, during which she “sparkled, using a clear and supple soprano to dash off numerous impeccable runs,” (Opera Now Magazine.) As a Tanglewood Vocal Fellow, she made her Boston Symphony Orchestra debut in an all Baroque Program with Susan Graham, as well as performed a number of duets by Monteverdi and Carissimi as part of an evening of opera with Mark Morris. Ms. Apostolou recently sang the US premier of Johan Christian Bach’s Vauxhall Songs with the New England Baroque Soloists, performed excerpts from both Purcell’s Harmonia Sacra and Vivaldi’s Bajazet with the Portland Opera and covered both Virtù and Valletto in L'incoronazione di Poppea at Central City Opera. Ms. Apostolou made her European debut with the International Chamber Ensemble as part of the Operafestival di Roma as Serpina in Pergolesi's La serva padrona.

The 2009-10 saw Ms. Apostolou’s debut with Vermont’s Green Mountain Opera festival as Adina in L’elisir d’amore and Barbarina in Le nozze di Figaro. Ms. Apostolou then joined the European tour of Mitch Sebastian’s The Opera Show, as well as performed her first Belinda in Dido and Aeneas with Opera Manhattan and Romilda in Serse with Pocket Opera New York. The summer of 2010 brought her to the Caramoor Festival under the baton of Will Crutchfield as Clotilde in Norma, as well as a performer in many of the festival’s Bel Canto at Caramoor concert series.

A favorite of Portland Opera, Ms. Apostolou has also performed Ms. Wordsworth in Albert Herring, Clorinda in La Cenerentola, Frasquita in Carmen, The High Priestess in Aida, Annina in La Traviata, and Countess Ceprano in Rigoletto, while she covered Violetta, Gilda, The Governess in The Turn of the Screw, and Marzelline in Fidelio. In 2007 at Central City Opera, she sang Noémie in the youth performance of Cendrillon, and Isabelle/Madeline in The Face on the Barroom Floor, and covered Annina in The Saint of Bleecker Street under the direction of Catherine Malfitano. She also toured as Carolina in Torroba’s Luisa Fernanda with the Tulsa Opera Studio.

Ms. Apostolou was a 2010 International Grand Finalist in the Competizione Dell’Opera hosted by the Semper Oper in Dresden, Germany and subsequently performed several concerts of arias with the Bremer Philharmoniker. On the American concert stage, Ms. Apostolou appeared with the Oregon Symphony as the soprano soloist in Vaughan Williams’ Serenade to Music, the First Fairy in Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and as Annina in excerpts from La Traviata. She’s also sung Miss Silverpeal in The Impresario with both the Portland Chamber Orchestra and the Walla Walla Symphony, as well as in The Pittsburgh Ballet Theater’s A Midsummer’s Night Dream, in the Fiddlesticks concerts with the Pittsburgh Symphony and in the world premiers of The Lost Childhood with American Opera Projects and Homeric Hymns with The Lyric Theater of New York. At Tanglewood, Ms. Apostolou performed Villa-Lobos's Bachianas Brasileiras No. 5 under the baton of Ken-David Mazur, the world premier of John Aylward’s Instant Conductors under the tutelage of Dawn Upshaw and John Harbison, and excerpts from the Chants D'auvergne as part of Tanglewood On Parade.

Ms. Apostolou was awarded 2nd place in the 2010 Jensen foundation competition, has been a three time Metropolitan Opera National Council Regional Finalist and encouragement award winner, and has received prizes from the Shreveport Singer of the Year Competition, The National Opera Association Annual Vocal Competition, the Orpheus Competition, The Irene Dalis Competition of Opera San Jose, and The Eleanor Lieber Competition of Portland Opera. In 2007, she received the Young Artist of the Year award from Central City Opera. Ms. Apostolou completed her Master of Music degree at the Manhattan School of Music, where she was seen in a variety of roles including Blanche de la Force in Dialogues des Carmélites, Zemire in Spohr’s Zemire und Azor, Nora in Vaughan Williams’ Riders to the Sea, and Vera in Hoiby’s A Month in the Country. Ms. Apostolou holds a bachelor of fine arts from Carnegie Mellon University.

She currently resides in Brooklyn, New York.
Current as of 9/12