Nadine Sierra's love affair with opera started with an overdue library video.
"When I was 10 years old my mother introduced me to opera in VHS form, it was 1982 production of La Bohème with Teresa Stratas and José Carreras and [Renata] Scotto," she recalled. "The first time I watched that I thought, 'Oh my god, that’s what I want.' We never returned it to the library, we still have it, and I occasionally watch it when I go home because it’s a nostalgic kind of experience — it's my childhood, that’s where it all began."
A mere six years later, she made her opera debut, singing Sandman in the Palm Beach Opera production of Hansel and Gretel under the legendary conductor Julius Rudel.
Since then she has been the youngest singer to win the Marilyn Horne Foundation Awards Competition, as well as the Met's National Council Audition Awards; debuted at the Paris Opera (Zerlina in Don Giovanni) and the Met (Gilda in Rigoletto). On July 25, the 28-year-old will add her Mostly Mozart debut to her résumé, performing in The Illuminated Heart, a pastiche of the festival namesake's work. "There will be a lot of audience favorites," the singer hinted, as the festival isn't disclosing the numbers included in the production.
In between rehearsals, Sierra visited WQXR's studios with accompanist Bryan Wagorn, an assistant conductor at the Met, to perform a pair of Mozart arias, as well as Stephen Foster's "Beautiful Dreamer." The inclusion of the last piece was inspired by Sierra's viewing of the upcoming Meryl Streep film, Florence Foster Jenkins, where she was able to meet the Oscar winner.
"Getting the actual opportunity to meet Meryl Streep, and to do that in a context where what she was involved in happens to be about opera and about Florence Foster Jenkins was really nice," she said. "It’s always special to see something in film that has to do with this particular industry."
Watch Sierra's performances: