Erin Bardua
Erin Bardua is a frequent soloist, voice teacher, and stage director.
Erin's practice as an artist on- and offstage encompasses new compositions, early music, and the work of historically excluded and underrepresented creators, in a range of styles from Western classical to commercial. She is a co-founder of Essential Opera.
Her goal as a director is to help artists use their voice as singers, communicators, and humans with autonomy and agency in their creative work. This translates into a performer-led approach with an emphasis on consent, inclusion, and accessibility in rehearsal and performance. It also means finding the story within the story, the one performers are most excited to tell and audiences are most eager to experience.
Erin has provided dramatic coaching and stage direction for COSA (Centre for Opera Studies and Appreciation), the Victoria Baroque Intensive, and the Halifax Summer Opera Festival (L'incoronazione di Poppea 2018, Alcina 2019). She returns to all three programs in summer 2024! She has also stage directed Mount Allison University's Opera Workshop, and assistant directed the Mount Allison Drama Department's production of Godspell in 2019.
Recent and upcoming performance highlights include an EP and companion film of the short opera Etiquette by composer Monica Pearce with Essential Opera. Other EO films and recordings include Pearce's December and Anna Pidgorna's Mirror Mirror. The company is currently developing a new opera with composer Fiona Ryan, In Her Hands: The Tragedy of Lady Macbeth.
Erin will be spending a lot of time in Halifax this spring, where she is featured in showcase performances at the 2024 Juno Awards and East Coast Music Awards, and in recital with the Music Room Chamber Concerts.
Onstage, Erin's operatic roles have included Alcina (Handel), numerous Mozart such as Pamina (The Magic Flute), Countess (The Marriage of Figaro) and Donna Anna (Don Giovanni), Antonia and Giulietta (The Tales of Hoffmann), and Nannetta (Falstaff). Erin has also premiered leading roles in several new operas, including Frankenstein by Andrew Ager, Regina by Elisha Denburg, and Heather: Cindy + Mindy = BFFs 4EVER by Christopher Thornborrow.
In concert, Ms. Bardua has performed with the Talisker Players, Nota Bene Baroque, Pax Christi Chorale, Toronto Sinfonietta, Oshawa-Durham Chorus, Arcady Baroque Ensemble, St. James Cathedral Choir, Capella Intima, London Pro Musica, and the Menno Singers, among others. Her concert repertoire includes Handel’s Messiah, Esther and Judas Maccabaeus, Zelenka’s Missa Omnium Sanctorum, Haydn’s Creation, Mozart’s Requiem and Vesperae solennes de confessore, Bach’s Magnificat and Passions, Vaughan Williams’ Hodie, and Vivaldi’s Gloria. She has also sung a wide variety of music in recital, ranging from early cantatas to jazz standards and contemporary works.