Jean del Santo

Ms. del Santo is a voice instructor at MacPhail Center for Music in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She served for three years as an onsite evaluator for the National Endowment for the Arts, Opera/ Musical Theater division. She was a frequent clinician/ adjudicator for the Classical Singer, Metropolitan Opera and National Association of Teachers of Singing vocal competitions. Her academic positions include the voice faculty of Michigan State University, University of Missouri, Kansas City and thirty years at University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, where she is presently Professor Emeritas.

Lyric soprano, Jean del Santo, has distinguished herself nationally on both the concert and operatic stage.  Critics have noted her outstanding vocal and dramatic qualities in reviews stating “She has a voice that is rich, resonant, true, pleasing and effortless in its projection-the kind of voice that sounds as if there is no end to it”, “ Jean del Santo has the vocal and emotional range to transcend the printed page and deliver a superb performance”. She has performed as soloist with the late Maestro Robert Shaw in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony (Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and National Symphony Orchestra at Kennedy Center in Washington DC), Verdi Requiem (San Francisco Festival of Masses), and Britten’s War Requiem which was aired on Nebraska Public Television. As soloist in Rossini’s Stabat Mater with Perform America, Ms. del Santo sang a two week concert tour in the country of Spain and was soprano soloist in Verdi Requiem with Varna International Music Festival during a two-week tour of Italy.  Ms. del Santo also appeared with Orquesta Sinfonica Nacional in Mexico City as soloist in Bach’s Mass in B Minor.

Her operatic credits include performances in San Francisco Opera’s Das Ring des Nebelungen (Wellgunde and Ortlinde), a four month tour with Western Opera Theater in the title role of Madama Butterfly,  regional performances in the leading roles of Fiordiligi in Cosi fan Tutte, Mimi and Musetta in La Boheme,  and Carlisle Floyd’s Susannah (televised and aired on PBS).