With a voice described as “dark hued” and “attractive throughout her range” by the New York Times, French mezzo-soprano Virginie Verrez is a rising star on the opera and concert stage. Virginie is a graduate of New York’s Juilliard School. She won the 2016 Dallas Opera Guild Vocal Competition and was a winner of the 2015 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. She was a member of the Metropolitan Opera’s Lindemann Young Artist Development Program 2015-2017.
Opera highlights in Virginie’s 2023/24 season include the title role in Carmen for Austin Opera. In concert, Virginie sings Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony with the Orchestre national de Lyon/ Nikolaj Szeps-Znaider in concerts at Auditori Nacional Madrid and Auditori di Barcelona and with the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra/ Nicholas Collon. In future seasons, Virginie makes her debut at Teatro alla Scala as Flosshilde in David McVicar’s new productions of Das Rheingold and Götterdämmerung, conducted by Christian Thielemann. Virginie’s portrayal of Prince Raphaël in La Princesse de Trébizonde for Opera Rara is released this year.
Recent highlights on stage have included Amastre Xerxes for the Komische Oper Berlin; Suzuki Madama Butterfly for Opéra National de Bordeaux; Stéphano Roméo et Juliette and Enrichetta I Puritani for the Metropolitan Opera; Cherubino Le nozze di Figaro and Suzuki Madama Butterfly for the Wiener Staatsoper; the title role in Carmen for the Welsh National Opera; Erika in Samuel Barber’s Vanessa in Santa Fe and for the Glyndebourne Festival; Prince Charmant Cendrillon for the Stadttheater Klagenfurt; Flora La traviatafor the Opéra national de Paris; Zerlina Don Giovanni for the Dallas Opera and Dorabella Così fan tutte for the Opéra de Lille. Virginie sang Emilia Otello alongside Jonas Kaufmann on the SONY label.
Recent concert engagements include Debussy’s La damoiselle élue with the Orchestre national de France/Bertrand de Billy and Berlioz’ Roméo et Juliette with the Orchestre national de France and Swedish Symphony Orchestra/Daniel Harding; Schumann’s Das Paradies und die Peri with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra/Daniel Harding; Beethoven‘s Mass in C with the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic/Karina Canellakis; Erika in Barber’s Vanessa with the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin/David Zinman; Haydn’s Nelson Mass with the Orchestre National de Lyon/Omer Meir Wellber; Shéhérazade with the Minnesota Orchestra; a Mozart Gala with Le Concert d’Astrée featuring performances in Paris and Bahrain and Duruflé’s Requiem with the Netherlands Radio Choir and Ed Spanjaard.
Virginie is a former member of the ensemble of the Wiener Staatsoper where her roles included Zerlina Don Giovanni, Cherubino Le nozze di Figaro, Bersi Andrea Chénier, Alisa Lucia di Lammermoor, Thibault Don Carlos and Meg Page Falstaff.