Lara Billings, Soprano

Dr. Lara Billings hails from Salt Lake City, Utah. One of her greatest musical accomplishments was her performance of the role of La madre in Luigi Dallapiccola’s twelve-tone opera, Il prigioniero, which was described in the Tallahassee Democrat as “a heartbreaking performance.” Additional roles include Fiordiligi in Così fan tutte, Micaëla in La tragédie de Carmen, Alice Ford in Falstaff, and the title role in Suor Angelica. As an orchestral soloist, Dr. Billings has sung the soprano solos in Rossini’s Stabat Mater, Mozart's Coronation Mass, and Vivaldi’s Gloria. She worked with composer Harold Schiffman at the world premiere performance of Alma, as a cover for the title role. As a recitalist, Dr. Billings has performed at various venues in Utah; Michigan; Maryland; Washington, DC; Florida; and Italy. Dr. Billings received a Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Utah, and a Master of Music degree from Florida State University, both with emphasis in Vocal Performance. She has studied Spanish extensively, as well as French, German, Italian, and Russian. She completed a Doctor of Music in Vocal Performance at Florida State University, where she specialized in Russian language and literature by performing numerous works in the Russian language, including Shostakovich’s piano trio Seven Poems of Aleksandr Blok and Prokofiev’s The Ugly Duckling. She has also done songs of Tchaikovsky, Glinka, Taneyev, Sviridov, Shaporin, Rachmaninoff, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Medtner. Dr. Billings has taught at Snow College in Ephraim, Utah since 2012. She has previously taught at Troy University in Troy, Alabama; the Orfeo Music Festival in Vipiteno/Sterzing, Italy; and was a graduate teaching assistant at Florida State University in Tallahassee, Florida.