Rachel Speirs
Soprano
"Speirs makes a big impact with her feisty acting and, when required, her seductive singing."
Seen and Heard International
.jpg)
Scottish Soprano Rachel Speirs' recent engagements include Titania in Purcell's The Fairy Queen (Longborough Festival Opera 2023), 'Discover Opera' recitals (English National Opera), and Theresa in The Great Stink, Ensemble in The Rake's Progress, and Ensemble/Lamplighter cover in Puccini's Manon Lescaut (English Touring Opera Spring 2024). In Summer and Autumn 2024 Rachel will sing Adina in The Implausible Potions of Dr Dulcamara and cover Musetta in La boheme for Longborough Festival Opera, and will cover the role of The Bird in Judith Weir's opera Blond Eckbert for English Touring Opera. Rachel also looks forward to making her solo debut at the Royal Albert Hall in May 2024, singing Mozart's Requiem.
Rachel is an Artist Practitioner for the Royal Opera House Create & Sing Programme, leads workshops with SEND participants and people living with dementia for the Wigmore Hall Music for Life programme and for English Touring Opera. She is passionate and experienced in sharing and creating music in community settings.
Schedule
Lamplighter (cover)/Ensemble - Manon Lescaut
Ensemble - The Rake's Progress
Theresa - The Great Stink
February - May 2024
English Touring Opera (UK Tour)
Mozart's Requiem - Soprano Soloist
12th May 2024, 7pm
Royal Albert Hall
with The Really Big Chorus (this concert supports the work of The Royal Society of Musicians. Find out more by clicking here)
Adina - L'elisir d'amore
Musetta (cover) - La bohème
May - August 2024
Longborough Festival Opera
"... relish the glossy sensuality of Rachel Speirs' Titania and the feistiness of the soprano's Hippolyta." - Opera Today, August 2023 (The Fairy Queen, Longborough Festival Opera)
"There are a plethora of excellent performances from among the young cast, not least from Rachel Speirs who plays both Titania and Hippolyta. With her highly persuasive soprano, she sings 'Thrice happy lovers' with a sense of drunken sarcasm, which suggests her own marriage to Theseus is far from happy, and feels a far cry from the 'purity' we might expect when it comes from Juno's lips." - Music OMH, August 2023 (The Fairy Queen, Longborough Festival Opera)
"Rachel Speirs as Lotty, meanwhile, has the sweetness of a true soubrette, and in some of the Act 2 ensembles – with all four singers forming a euphonious ensemble and Speirs sparkling up on top – they make an enjoyable case for this unassuming opera as more than the sum of its (pleasant enough) parts." - Gramophone, January 2023 (The Soldier's Legacy, Retrospect Opera)
"Tenor Joseph Doody and Soprano Rachel Speirs are much younger performers than Keeble and Hayes, but are entirely convincing as the two lovers around which much of the plot will revolve." - The Light Music Society, February 2023 (The Soldier's Legacy, Retrospect Opera)
"She has lyric instincts and operatic powers in reserve, and the latter are certainly engaged by 'A sa dame malade'" - MusicWeb International, 2021 (The Fabulous Sir John CD Recording, Divine Art Records)