Tickets available starting August 1, 2026.
Location: TBD
Program TBD
About The Artist:
Daveda Karanas
Mezzo-Soprano
Greek-American mezzo-soprano Daveda Karanas has been hailed for her “capacious power” and “a voice lustrous and exciting.” (San Francisco Chronicle). In the 2024-2025 season, Ms. Karanas performed Edward Elgar’s Sea Pictures with LaGrange Symphony Orchestra. In the 2023-2024 season, Ms. Karanas made her highly anticipated house debut with Teatro Real, captivating audiences with her portrayal of Liese in The Passenger. These performances garnered widespread acclaim, paving the way for an album recording with Deutsche Grammophon and a video recording with Television Española. During the 2021-2022 season, Ms. Karanas made her house and role debut as The Mikado in The Montana Mikado with Intermountain Opera Bozeman, performed the Narrator in Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf with LaGrange Symphony Orchestra, and debuted in a series of opera concerts with Festival de Musique de Saint-Barth conducted by Steven Mercurio. Future seasons will see Ms. Karanas at Teatro Real, Hawaii Opera Theatre, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, and LaGrange Symphony Orchestra.
In addition to her operatic work, she is an advocate for historically underrepresented voices in classical music. She has curated and performed a series of recitals focused on the preservation and dissemination of lesser-known vocal works by Jewish composers, particularly those whose lives and careers were impacted by the Holocaust, as well as repertoire by African American composers and women composers. Her commitment to this repertoire includes her forthcoming world premiere recording of the orchestrated version of Dorothy Rudd Moore’s From the Dark Tower. Through this work, she continues to contribute to the equitable representation of marginalized voices in concert and recital repertoire.
Ms. Karanas made her Carnegie Hall debut in Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 with the Athens Philharmonic conducted by Yiannis Hadjiloizou and made her debut at The Israeli Opera singing Liese in The Passenger, a role she has performed at Florida Grand Opera and Detroit Opera following her successful debut of the role at Lyric Opera of Chicago. Other recent engagements include a major role debut as Kundry in Parsifal at the Lyric Opera of Chicago under Sir Andrew Davis, and debuts at the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis as Mother Marie in Dialogues of the Carmelites and with the Auckland Philharmonia as Brangäne in concert performances of Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde.
Ms. Karanas made her German debut at Oper Frankfurt as Marfa in Khovanshchina and debuted at the Canadian Opera Company as Brangäne in Tristan und Isolde conducted by Johannes Debus and directed by Peter Sellars. She joined the roster of the Metropolitan Opera in their production of the Berlioz masterpiece Les Troyens covering the role of Cassandre and made an acclaimed European debut at the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino as Judit in Bluebeard’s Castle under Zsolt Hamar in the festival’s 75th Anniversary. Daveda debuted the role of Azucena in Il trovatore at Opera Grand Rapids and sang her first performances of Amneris in Aida at Arizona Opera, followed by Vancouver Opera, and The Glimmerglass Festival in a new production by Francesca Zambello. She made her New Orleans Opera debut as Hasbeena in The Burlesque Opera Tabasco and made her role debut as Ježibaba in Rusalka at Arizona Opera.
Ms. Karanas completed her first complete Ring Cycle at San Francisco Opera under Donald Runnicles. In Francesca Zambello’s staging, she sang both Waltraute and the 2nd Norn in the new production of Götterdämmerung and Waltraute in Die Walküre. Other San Francisco Opera credits include Suzuki in Madama Butterfly, Mamka in Boris Godunov, Mistress of Novices in Suor Angelica, covering Amneris in Aida and Azucena in Il Trovatore. She also covered Brangäne in Tristan und Isolde with Seattle Opera and covered Judit in Bluebeard’s Castle with Saito Kinen Festival conducted by Seiji Ozawa.
Ms. Karanas is a Grand Finals Winner of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. She also received an Encouragement Award from the George London Foundation, was an International Semi-Finalist in the Neue Stimmen Competition, an Encouragement Award recipient at the Marilyn Horne Foundation Competition, and Grand Prize Winner of the Arizona Opera League Competition.
She is a graduate of the prestigious Adler Fellowship Program at San Francisco Opera. Ms. Karanas further trained at esteemed institutions including Merola Opera Program, Music Academy of the West, and Chicago Opera Theater. Ms. Karanas is a graduate of Arizona State University and Southeastern Louisiana University.
Ms. Karanas serves as Associate Professor of Voice and Division Chair of Vocal Studies at Texas State University, where she mentors the next generation of vocal artists and educators.