Biography
“Andrea Baker is a beautiful, talented mezzo with a sublime voice.”
Peter McCallum
The Sydney Morning Herald
Described as possessing a “luscious and full-bodied tone” (Das Opernglas), British-American mezzo-soprano Andrea Baker is renowned for her distinctive voice, intense artistry, and passion. Andrea Baker began her career as Schwertleite in Die Walküre with the San Francisco Opera under Sir Donald Runnicles. Further international appearances have included the title role in Carmen for Opera Australia, the Finnish National Opera, and Opera Leipzig; Serena in Porgy and Bess for The Edinburgh International Festival, the Berlin Philharmonic (Rattle), Opera Lyon, and Houston Grand Opera; Amneris in Aida for Wiesbaden State Theatre, Nuremberg State Theatre, Dortmund State Theatre, and Mannheim National Theatre; Ortrud in Lohengrin for the German National Theatre in Weimar, the Daegu Festival, Korea, Wiesbaden State Theatre, and Kassel State Theatre; Venus in Tannhäuser for the Teatro Lirico Giuseppe Verdi in Trieste; 1st Norn in Götterdämmerung for the BBC Proms (Runnicles) and Bavarian State Opera (Mehta); Fricka, Waltraute, and 2nd Norn in Wagner’s Ring at Beijing Music Festival (Auguin), The International May Festival (Piollet), Mannheim National Theatre (Fischer), and Nuremberg State Theatre (Auguin); Stolzius’ Mother in Die Soldaten for the Wiesbaden State Theatre; The Pilgrim’s Progress with London Philharmonia Orchestra (Hickox); Herodias in Salome with the London Symphony Orchestra (Hickox), Wiesbaden State Theatre (Lange), and Hannover State Theatre; Schwertleite in Die Walküre at the Salzburg Easter Festival, Aix en Provence Festival (Rattle), and Edinburgh International Festival (Davis); Mrs. Grose in The Turn of the Screw for the Festival de Ópera de Tenerife; Ismene in the world premiere of Dominique LeGendre’s The Burial at Thebes, directed by Nobel Prize Laureate Derek Walcott with a libretto by Nobel Prize Laureate Seamus Heaney, at London’s Globe Theatre (Manning); and Waltraute (cover) in Wagner’s Ring for The Metropolitan Opera, New York (Levine).
Ms Baker has collaborated with the conductors Zubin Mehta, Sir Simon Rattle, James Levine, Sir Donald Runnicles, Richard Hickox, Antonio Pappano, Philippe Auguin, Valery Gergiev, Marin Alsop, Ádám Fischer, and Sir Charles Mackerras. Her career has led her to many of the world’s greatest concert halls, including The Royal Albert Hall, The Barbican, The Berliner Philharmonie, The Konzerthaus Berlin, Amsterdam’s Royal Concertgebouw, Rome’s Orchestra Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, Tokyo Opera City, and the Cité de la Musique in Paris.
Ms Baker studied singing at the Aspen Music Festival and the Eastman School of Music with Jan Degaetani, and privately in San Francisco with Blanche Thebom. She was a Metropolitan Opera Competition National finalist.
“Andrea Baker, in rich, dark voice as a vengeful and contemptuous Herodias.”
David Murray, Financial Times
In addition to her celebrated work on the opera stage, Ms Baker has taken on an extraordinary breadth of voices across various media. Her one-woman series Sing Sistah Sing!© is a joyous, soulful celebration of the voice of the African diaspora. The first in this series was the award-winning celebration of the African American female voice, this ground-breaking show has toured to sold out audiences around the world, most recently at the 2020 Edinburgh International Festival. The second in the series is Sing Sistah Sing!© Tales of Transatlantic Freedom with new co-creator and multi-instrumentalist Howard Moody, is a glorious exploration of our global musical heritage. Out of the pain of the diaspora narrative comes the richness of spirituals, jazz, blues, gospel, opera, and the songs of Robert Burns. Tales Of Transatlantic Freedom premiered in 2022 to rave reviews in the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. It makes its debut in the United States during Black History Month at Boston’s iconic Museum of Fine Arts at the invitation of the National Racial Amity Centre and with Yard Heads International as producers. The show continues to wow audiences internationally and will return to the United States in February 2025.
Sing Sistah Sing!© is also a vehicle for her work as a civil rights activist, the show has been performed in conjunction with truth and reconciliation events in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, Boston Massachusetts and toured extensively in the UK, France and Germany as part of Black History Month celebrations. The artist was invited to perform at Holyrood for their first event kicking off Scotland’s Black History Month celebrations in 2019.
As a radio presenter and documentary maker she can be heard across the BBC, including on Radio Scotland, Radio 4, World Service and Radio 3’s Sounds Connected, and has produced her own podcasts for The Big Light Network.