Soprano Jesica Santino is currently pursuing her Master of Music in Voice Performance degree at Temple University in Philadelphia, studying with mezzo-soprano Dr. Kathryn Leemhuis.
In her 23/24 season, Ms. Santino is excited to present her Master’s Recital, Flora, Fauna, and Fantasy, featuring music on the theme of nature and magic, including works by Barbara Strozzi, Francesca Caccini, Handel, Felix and Fanny Mendelssohn, Debussy, Bizet, and Lori Laitman. Additionally, she will be performing in The Opera Project’s Harvest Concert.
During the 22/23 season, Ms. Santino made her role debut as The Queen of the Night in Mozart’s Die Zuaberflöte with the Matador Opera Workshop in Lubbock, TX. She was featured as Marie (Donizetti’s La fille du régiment) in Temple Opera Theater’s Scenes Program. In the spring of 2023, she sang in the Voice and Opera Student Recital: Women Composers from Around the World concert in partnership with A Modern Reveal. In the fall of 2022, she covered Eliza in Nico Muhly’s Dark Sisters, directed by Brandon McShaffrey and conducted by Danielle Jagelski.
Ms. Santino received her Bachelor of Music degree from The University of Tulsa under the tutelage of bass-baritone Brady McElligott, where she debuted Lola in Douglas Moore’s Gallantry, the title role of Friedrich von Flotow’s Martha, performed in English, and Mrs. Fiorentino in Kurt Weill’s Street Scene. Ms. Santino’s performance in Martha was described as “elegant and refined,” with a “voice [that] filled the hall, often blending beautifully with…mezzo soprano Katelyn Baker, who played Nancy” (The Collegian). She also was featured in University of Tulsa Opera Theater’s scene program as Josephine (H.M.S. Pinafore). In 2018, she attended the Institute for the International Education of Students (I.E.S.) Abroad, Vienna Music Summer Program, and performed scenes from Mozart’s Così fan tutte as Fiordiligi.
On the concert stage, Ms. Santino has been a soloist in Benjamin Britten’s Rejoice in the Lamb, and a cover for Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Serenade to Music with The University of Tulsa’s Capella Chamber Singers, and as the soprano soloist in Johannes Brahms’ Liebeslieder-Walzer in the IES Abroad Summer Concert.
Ms. Santino is honored to have won various awards and competitions, including the Sigma Alpha Iota (S.A.I.) Patroness Scholarship for Music, she was a Recognition Recitalist with the Tulsa Symphony Orchestra, and received the S.A.I. Alumnae Chapter Cindy Harmon Scholarship, the Hyechka Club of Tulsa’s Laven Sowell Collegiate Vocal Award, the S.A.I. Summer Music Scholarship, and the Mary Bowles Memorial Scholarship. She has been a masterclass participant with Mary Jane Johnson, Amy Shoremount-Obra, Marcus DeLoach, Kyle and Laura Pfortmiller, Michelle Friedman, and Kristen Roach.
