Ryan Opera Center From Home: Emily Pogorelc

Soprano Emily Pogorelc, a Milwaukee native and 2018 graduate of Philadelphia's Curtis Institute of Music, has just concluded her two-year tenure with the Ryan Opera Center. After debuting at the Glimmerglass Festival and Washington National Opera, Emily came to Chicago and made her Lyric debut as Noémie in Massenet's Cendrillon. Since then, she has been seen as the Trainbearer in Elektra, a Paralegal in Dead Man Walking and Masha in The Queen of Spades.

Keep reading to see how Emily has continued to work from home during the ongoing COVID-19 crisis.

Currently, I am at my childhood home in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. In addition to getting some quality time with family, I've been doing a lot of role study for my upcoming season as an ensemble member of Munich's Bayerische Staatsoper. First up has been work on Hänsel und Gretel--I'm singing Gretel in December! I've been doing a lot of work on the language and diction, as the libretto includes several German fairytale words not commonly used.

Over the past two months with my Ryan Opera Center family, I've had several lessons with Julia Faulkner, using FaceTime and Zoom. She introduced me to this app, "Appcompanist", and I have been singing my favorite arias Karaoke-style to my heart's content. As a group, we also have had German class, working on grammar— the sentence structure is a little tricky! I've also been working with my colleagues to continue sharing music with not only our Lyric Opera community, but music lovers worldwide. Check out one of our videos from the Ryan Opera Center From Home series below and stay tuned for more!

Sending love and wishes for good health to everyone.

-Emily Pogorelc

Header photo: Jaclyn Simpson