School of Music

Melanie Galloway, artistic director of opera and associate professor, comes to APU from New York City. Her area of expertise, training and performing, has been in the fields of opera and classical song literature. She has a special love for opera and is passionate about teaching and training young artists in this field, equaled only by her love for performing it. Her roots in opera are ardent and deep, and began when as a very young child she was smitten by performances of the great Marilyn Horne at the Metropolitan Opera, and the great Leontyne Price in a song recital which included ten stunning aria encores. Melanie’s mother insists that Melanie was able to sing a high C at infancy, or at least that’s what it sounded like in the middle of the night...

As a teacher, Melanie has successfully guided her voice students to winning auditions and scholarships to summer programs and leading graduate schools such as Mannes, Manhattan School of Music, and San Francisco Conservatory.

Professionally, Galloway has sung principal roles in opera and as the soprano soloist in orchestral and chamber music in the United States, across Europe and parts of Asia. Highlights include being selected to sing in the United States premiere of Judith Weir’s opera Vanishing Bridegroom with St. Louis Opera, and as an “Artist on the Rise” in Belgium, which led to international concerts, radio broadcasts and interviews. Other highlights include winning the Metropolitan Opera National Council District Awards, and the Médaille D’Honneur in the Concours Lyrique International de France. She received her Doctorate of Musical Arts in Vocal Performance and a minor in Theatre and Directing on full scholarship from the University of Illinois. She has also had the privilege of using her gifts to sing in Thailand, the Philippines, and Peru to benefit local churches for world outreach and education.

Some of Melanie Galloway's professional repertoire includes singing principle operatic roles such as Micaela: Carmen, Marguerite: Faust, Mimi: La Boheme, and the soprano soloist in Brahms' Ein Deutsches Requiem in several September 11th Memorial/Remembrance concerts, A Sea Symphony by Ralph Vaughan Williams, Vivaldi’s Gloria and Bach’s Cantatas No. 36, 57, and 187.

Melanie continues to perform and polish her skills through training: this past year she studied Italian in Florence on a full scholarship, while refining her performance and audition techniques singing in Master Classes given by Gayletha Nichols, the Executive Director of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, and coaching vocally with Coach/Conductor Cristiano Manzoni in Italy. She also added singing as the soprano soloist in Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 to her repertoire, and then went on to further her professional opera training at OperaWorks, the opera training program, this past summer.

While she considers it an honor to have worked with many fine conductors, coaches, and directors such as Steven Marinaro, Kurt Klippstatter, Joan Dorneman, Jim de Blasis, Colin Graham, Francesca Zambello, and Deborah Birnbaum, one of the most meaningful and artistic influences in her life has been her teacher, Diana Soviero, in New York City. Galloway is a full member in the National Association of Teachers of Singing.