Singer & performer
Photo: Jane Stokes
As Phyllis in Iolanthe with Forbear! Theatre, 2018. Photo: Jane Stokes
Joanna is a soprano who graduated from the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama with an MMus with Merit in 2017, where she studied with Kate Woolveridge and David Doidge. She now studies with Yvette Bonner and performed in the chorus of Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore with Longborough Festival Opera in summer 2023, having performed in the chorus of their production of Anna Bolena in 2019 and as Frantik/Hen in their Emerging Artists production of The Cunning Little Vixen in 2021.
Joanna regularly performs roles with Forbear! Theatre, including Josephine, HMS Pinafore 2023; Gianetta, The Gondoliers 2022 & 2023; Mabel, The Pirates of Penzance 2020; Plaintiff, Trial by Jury 2019; Saphir, Patience 2019; Phyllis, Iolanthe 2016 & 2018; and Princess of Monte Carlo, The Grand Duke 2018. She played Barbarina in Ensemble OrQuesta’s Le nozze di Figaro in 2021, toured with the National G&S Opera Company for two years (including as Peep Bo, The Mikado 2017) and was soprano soloist in a Remembrance concert of Charpentier and Bruckner with the Broadstone Choir in Dorset.
As Pianist in Kommilitonen! with Welsh National Youth Opera, 2016. Photo: Kirsten McTernan
Opportunities at RWCMD included playing Amore (Monteverdi's Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria) in Opera Scenes 2017, Mrs Page (Vaughan Williams’ Sir John in Love) in Opera Scenes 2016 and soprano solos in Bach’s Weihnachtsoratorium and Britten’s A Ceremony of Carols in 2015. In 2016 Joanna also performed in the choruses of the college productions of Le Nozze di Figaro and Falstaff, and as Red Guard I and pianist in Welsh National Youth Opera's critically acclaimed production of Kommilitonen! by Peter Maxwell Davies.
Joanna is a regular soloist with the Wandering Minstrels, who perform concerts of G&S.
Joanna graduated with a BMus (Hons) from the University of Birmingham in 2014, studying voice with Catherine Benson for 3 years there. During her undergraduate degree she sang in several choirs, vocal ensembles and a cappella groups including solos with Birmingham University Singers and University Women’s Choir (runners-up in the Choir of the World final, Llangollen 2014). She also played Carlotta in the musical theatre group's acclaimed production of The Phantom of the Opera, Eurydice in Orpheus in the Underworld, and understudied Countess Almaviva in The Marriage of Figaro.
Backstage at the Royal Hall, Harrogate in The Pirates of Penzance with National G&S Opera Company, 2018. Photo: Jane Stokes
Joanna is also dance trained and took part in dance shows for 15 years, specialising in freestyle but also studying ballroom, Latin, tap and ballet.
You can watch recordings of Joanna’s work by going to Video.