Francesca Chiejina

Soprano Francesca Chiejina has a varied repertory stretching from the Baroque to the Second Viennese School to newly composed works. She has appeared widely in Britain, where she was partly trained. Chiejina was born in 1991 in Lagos, Nigeria. Her father was a corporate communications professional, and her parents enrolled her and her five other siblings in violin and piano lessons at Lagos' MUSON Centre. In 1999, Chiejina's parents moved to the U.S. She studied not only violin and piano in high school but also French horn and voice. Chiejina joined her high school choir, singing alto, but at first, she had little interest in a vocal career; she simply considered the choir an easy way to earn academic credit, but voice teachers spotted her gift and urged her to develop it. Chiejina enrolled at the University of Michigan, at first pursuing premed courses, but finding that she was enjoying choir more than her science classes, she switched to music. Her primary teacher at Michigan was soprano Martha Sheil; Chiejina started as a mezzo-soprano but later found her niche as a soprano. A turning point came when she was assigned Brahms' song Von ewiger Liebe, Op. 43, No. 1, looked up interpretations of the song online and found one by Jessye Norman. Chiejina went on to the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London, studying with Sue McCullough. At this point, her parents finally became reconciled to her choice of career. She won the English Song Prize and the Aria Prize during this period. She took master classes from pianist Martin Katz, soprano Felicity Lott, and mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato, among others; the latter became a major influence. A breakthrough came when she was accepted into the Jette Parker Young Artists Program at London's Royal Opera. There, she began performing roles such as Elvira in Mozart's Don Giovanni and Countess Ceprano in Verdi's Rigoletto. After graduating, Chiejina found herself in demand for both opera and concert appearances. She has appeared at the Royal Opera House as the High Priestess in Verdi's Aida, as Clara in Gershwin's Porgy and Bess at the Grange Park Opera, and in several roles with the English Touring Opera, among others. On the concert stage, she performed Berg's Seven Early Songs with the Sinfonia of London at the BBC Proms, Samuel Barber's Knoxville: Summer of 1915 with the BBC Philharmonic and the Royal Northern Sinfonia, and Handel's Messiah with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra at the Royal Albert Hall. Chiejina made her recording debut in 2023 on the Chandos album Transfigured: Schoenberg, A. Mahler, Webern, Zemlinsky.
© James Manheim /TiVo