Hailed as “a singer to watch” (Classical Voice America), London-born mezzo-soprano Joanne Evans has spent the 2022-2023 season performing as a Resident Artist with Opera Colorado, in the roles of Maddalena in Rigoletto and Lucienne in Die Tote Stadt. Joanne is immensely excited to be joining the Merola Opera Program this summer. As Olga in Eugene Onegin with Music Academy last summer, Joanne “was a magnificently earthy Olga, her rich mezzo tone and prescient temperament, perfect for the role” (Voice Magazine). Joanne was most recently named winner of the Music Academy’s 2022 Marilyn Horne Song Competition. Joanne is also a 2022 District winner of the Met Opera Laffont Competition, winner of the Handel Aria Competition. and a proud beneficiary of a Career Bridges grant.

Music Academy 2022 Duo Competition winner Yu-Ting Peng is currently pursuing her Doctorate in Keyboard Collaborative Arts with Kevin Fitz-Gerald at the USC Thornton School of Music. She completed her master’s degree in piano performance as a teaching assistant at the California State University, Northridge, where she received the Outstanding Student award, Jakob Gimpel scholarship, and first prize of the concerto competition at CSUN, allowing her to perform with the orchestra. Throughout her musical career, she has trained under well-known professors including John Perry, Dmitry Rachmanov, Alan Smith, and Bernadene Blaha. She has studied in masterclass with Yuan Sheng, Meng-Chieh Lui, Daniel Shapiro, and more. Peng attends summer festivals regularly including Music Academy, Bowdoin International Music Festival, Montecito International Music Festival, and the John Perry Academy of Music. She is currently working as a collaborative pianist at Thornton School of Music.

Winner of the Music Academy’s 2022 Marilyn Horne Song Competition Tzu-Kuang Tan is a Malaysian pianist. He is a graduate of the University of Michigan, studying with Amy I-Lin Cheng and Martin Katz and the Yong Siew Toh Conservatory in Singapore, studying under Albert Tiu. He was named the winner of the 2021 Jacqueline Avent Concerto Competition and 2018 Yong Siew Toh Conservatory Concerto Competition. He was an assistant coach and rehearsal pianist for the mainstage productions of Don Pasquale, Highway 1, and Rise up for Freedom at the University of Michigan. He was also rehearsal pianist for Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin at Music Academy and assistant music director for Music On Site production of Cosi Fan Tutte. He is a member of Trio Amabile. The Trio have enjoyed performing across the Greater Detroit Metropolitan Area, giving full recitals at the East Bloomfield Public Library’s Chamber Series and the Scarab Club.

From becoming a National YoungArts Finalist in 2017, to winning the inaugural Kennesaw State University Concerto Competition in 2018, to becoming the first tubist to win the Duo Competition at the Music Academy in 2022, Joshua has found a way to beat the odds with virtuosic playing of the low toned clunky instrument. Hailing from Atlanta, Joshua grew up fascinated in many different genres of music, with classical, jazz, gospel, and soul music being his predominant interest. His skill over the tuba earned Joshua a full-ride Kovner Fellowship to The Juilliard school where he studied with Alan Baer and Weston Sprott. While pursuing a performance and freelance career in New York City, Joshua also maintained a teaching fellowship through the demanding ear training department at Juilliard, while working with the Music Advancement Program and Gluck Fellowships. Currently Joshua is set to join the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra for a two-year residency in the fall of 2023.

Chinese-American pianist and Music Academy 2022 Solo Piano Competition winner Adria Ye has been driven from a young age by a hopeless fascination with music, old and new. Described by cellist David Finckel as having a “naturally beautiful sound and lyric instinct,” she made her orchestral debut at nine with the Oregon Sinfonietta and has performed as soloist and chamber musician across Europe, China, and the United States. She has been featured in radio broadcasts of “Performance Today” with Fred Child, and National Public Radio’s “From the Top.” Most recently, she was the recipient of the Paul Streit Special Prize at the 2022 Concours de Genéve. Adria is currently pursuing a Graduate Diploma at New England Conservatory with Wha-Kyung Byun. Previously, she studied with Julian Martin and Yoheved Kaplinsky at The Juilliard School.

• Angie is earning her doctorate at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, studying with Logan Skelton;
• Angie has performed at Bravo! Vail Festival, Sarasota Music Festival, and with orchestras including the National Symphony Orchestra of the Dominican Republic and Juilliard Orchestra;
• Awards include the Peter Mennin Award for Outstanding Achievement and Leadership in Music and Grand Prize Winner in the Yamaha Young Performing Artists Competition.