Press Release
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 3, 2016
The Kennedy Center and Washington National Opera
announce
Janai Brugger
is the 2016 winner of
The Marian Anderson Vocal Award
Brugger to perform a recital at the Kennedy Center on September 8, 2016
and will mentor young students during a new residency program
at D.C.’s Duke Ellington School of the Arts
(WASHINGTON)—The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and Washington National
Opera (WNO) today announced that soprano Janai Brugger is the 2016 winner of the Marian Anderson
Vocal Award. The Award, which honors trailblazing contralto Marian Anderson’s personal and
humanitarian achievements, celebrates excellence in performance by recognizing a young American
singer who has achieved initial professional success in the vocal arts and who exhibits promise for a
significant career. In addition to receiving a $10,000 cash prize, Ms. Brugger will perform a recital on
Thursday, September 8, 2016 in the Kennedy Center Family Theater and will establish an educational
residency at the opera workshop program of Washington’s Duke Ellington School of the Arts.
“I am so excited to win this prestigious award and to join the ranks of so many past winners
who continue to inspire me,” said Ms. Brugger. “I can’t wait to work with the students at Duke
Ellington and to share with them how Marian Anderson’s enduring legacy continues to shape my
career and my life.”
Janai Brugger is one of opera’s brightest rising stars. She was the 2012 winner of Plácido
Domingo’s prestigious Operalia competition, taking all three prizes, and the same year she won the
Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. She recently made her WNO debut as Micaëla in
Carmen, a role she will sing later this season at Lyric Opera of Kansas City. She also returns to LA
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Opera later in the 2015-2016 season as Musetta in La bohème with conductor Gustavo Dudamel and
makes her role debut as Norina in Don Pasquale at Palm Beach Opera, following her past success
there as Juliette in Roméo et Juliette in 2010. Recent highlights include her debut at London’s Royal
Opera House as Pamina in Die Zauberflöte and a return appearance at the Metropolitan Opera as
Helena in The Enchanted Island, which followed her debut in 2012 as Liù in Turandot. She has
numerous concert and recital appearances to her credit, including the recent Metropolitan Opera
Summer Recital Series at Brooklyn Bridge Park and on Central Park’s SummerStage, as well as
several appearances in the Met’s Rising Stars Concert Series nationwide.
In keeping with its mission to develop programs and initiatives that connect exemplary artists
with the community, the Kennedy Center will work with Ms. Brugger to create a curriculum for an
educational residency at the Duke Ellington School of the Arts, the District of Columbia’s public arts
magnet high school. The residency will include master classes and workshops with vocal music
students, as well as other events developed by Ms. Brugger. The school offers a dual curriculum
encompassing professional arts training along with academic enrichment, helping to prepare its
students for both college and future careers in the arts.
“Janai Brugger is an outstanding artist and I am thrilled that she is the Marian Anderson Vocal
Award winner this year,” said WNO Artistic Director Francesca Zambello. “The life and career of
Marian Anderson stands as a stirring example to all young artists, and Janai’s work with the remarkable
vocal students at the Duke Ellington School will honor that legacy in very meaningful ways.”
To celebrate the Award, Ms. Brugger will also perform a recital on Thursday, September 8,
2016 in the Kennedy Center Family Theater. Ticket information for the recital will be announced in
the coming weeks.
Ms. Brugger was selected from a pool of singers who were nominated by opera companies,
orchestral and choral organizations, agents, professional music critics, and other organizations and
individuals across the country. The selection committee included distinguished members of the opera
and classical music communities, including James Conlon (LA Opera), Jonathan Friend (The
Metropolitan Opera), Jeremy Geffen (Carnegie Hall), Charles MacKay (Santa Fe Opera), Francesca
Zambello (WNO), and Brian Zeger (The Juilliard School).
Prior Award recipients include Sylvia McNair, Denyce Graves, Philip Zawisza, Nancy
Maultsby, Patricia Racette, Michelle DeYoung, Nathan Gunn, Marguerite Krull, Eric Owens,
Lawrence Brownlee, Indira Mahajan, Sasha Cooke, J’nai Bridges, and most recently, Jamie Barton.
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Beginning this year, the Award will be given on an annual basis. Nominations for the 2017 Award will
open in September 2016.
ABOUT JANAI BRUGGER
Unique in winning all three categories in Plácido Domingo’s prestigious Operalia competition and in
the same year—2012—the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, American soprano Janai
Brugger began the 2015-2016 season as Micaëla in Carmen at Washington National Opera, reviving
the role later in the season at Lyric Opera of Kansas City.
Identified by Opera News as one of their top 25 “brilliant young artists” (October 2015 issue),
she made her Metropolitan Opera debut as Liù in Turandot in 2012, and this season joined the Met
roster for several appearances in their Rising Stars Concert Series. This season she makes several U.S.
concert and recital appearances, as well as her debut as Norina in Don Pasquale at Palm Beach Opera.
She returns to LA Opera to revive the role of Musetta in La bohème, which she sings under the baton
of Gustavo Dudamel.
Recent highlights include her debut at London’s Royal Opera House as Pamina in Die
Zauberflöte and a return appearance at the Metropolitan Opera as Helena in The Enchanted Island,
which followed her debut in 2012 as Liù in Turandot. In previous seasons, she made her debut as
Micaëla in Carmen with Opera Colorado; she sang High Priestess in Aida at the Hollywood Bowl with
the Los Angeles Philharmonic; Juliette in Roméo et Juliette at Palm Beach Opera; as a member of the
Domingo-Thornton Young Artist Program, her LA Opera appearances include Barbarina in Le nozze di
Figaro under the baton of Plácido Domingo, Page in Rigoletto with James Conlon, and Musetta in La
bohème with Patrick Summers. Cover assignments as a young artist included the roles of Mrs.
Neruda in Il Postino and the Governess in The Turn of the Screw.
Among her numerous concert appearances are the Peter Dvorsky Festival in the Czech
Republic; the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra during the May Festival under the baton of James
Conlon; the Ravinia Festival with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra as First Lady in Die
Zauberflöte under the baton of James Conlon; Grant Park Festival’s Fourth of July open air concert
before 10,000 people; and the Philadelphia Orchestra in its 2013 gala concert performance.
Additionally, she appeared in the New York Festival of Song and with countertenor David Daniels for
performances of The Messiah in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
A native of Chicago, she obtained a master’s degree from the University of Michigan, where
she studied with the late Shirley Verrett. She earned her bachelor’s degree from DePaul University,
where she studied with Elsa Charlston. In 2010, she participated in the Merola Opera Program at San
Francisco Opera, and went onto become a young artist at LA Opera for two seasons. Future
engagements include return engagements at the Metropolitan Opera and the Royal Opera House.
ABOUT MARIAN ANDERSON
American contralto Marian Anderson was one of the most celebrated singers of the 20th century. She
became an important figure in the struggle for African-American artists to overcome racial prejudice in
the United States, when in 1939, the Daughters of the American Revolution refused permission for her
to sing to an integrated audience in Constitution Hall. The incident placed Anderson into the spotlight
of the international community on a level unusual for a classical musician. With the aid of First Lady
Eleanor Roosevelt and her husband President Franklin D. Roosevelt, she performed a critically
acclaimed open-air concert on Easter Sunday, April 9, 1939, on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in
Washington, D.C. before a crowd of more than 75,000 people and a radio audience in the millions.
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She continued to break barriers, becoming the first African-American artist to perform at the
Metropolitan Opera in New York on January 7, 1955. Her performance as Ulrica in Giuseppe Verdi’s
Un ballo in maschera was the only time she sang an opera role on stage. She later worked for several
years as a delegate to the United Nations Human Rights Committee and for the U.S. Department of
State, giving concerts all over the world. She participated in the civil rights movement in the 1960s,
singing at the March on Washington in 1963. She was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in
1963, the Kennedy Center Honors in 1978, the National Medal of Arts in 1986, and a Grammy®
Lifetime Achievement Award in 1991.
The initial impetus for The Marian Anderson Vocal Award was provided by June Goodman of
Danbury, Connecticut, a friend of Ms. Anderson’s who wished to recognize the outstanding qualities
of the groundbreaking African-American singer. The Marian Anderson Award Foundation then
established the Award at Fairfield County’s Community Foundation. In September 2002, the Kennedy
Center and Fairfield County’s Community Foundation collaborated to create a permanent tribute to
Ms. Anderson’s historic artistic achievements by presenting a cash prize of $10,000 and a recital at the
Kennedy Center for one outstanding singer
For more information on The Marian Anderson Vocal Award,
please visit www.kennedy-center.org/programs/awards/marian.html.
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PRESS CONTACT
Michael Solomon
(202) 416-8453
[email protected]
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