Biography
German-Indian American
mezzo-soprano
Nandani Maria Sinha
is internationally acclaimed for her passionate
performances and presence.
Ms. Sinha received her pre-collegiate vocal and piano training in Germany. She returned to the United States to earn her Bachelor of Music cum laude in vocal performance from Cornell University and her Master of Music from California State University at Los Angeles, where she was honored as a CSULA Friend of Music Scholar and elected as a member of Phi Kappa Phi Academic Honors Society.
An in-demand soloist, Ms. Sinha has frequently returned to St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City and the Franz Liszt Chamber Orchestra, and has given recitals in London, France, Austria, and Germany, where she was honored to sing for the Millennium Festival of Music in Bad Arolsen. She toured South Africa as a recitalist for the No.1 Ladies’ Opera Festival. Ms. Sinha is a great proponent of new music and has presented multiple premieres by Annenberg Foundation Composition Fellow Maria Newman, including “Parting Words” on September 11th, 2014. She is a favorite mezzo-soprano in Southern California, performing regularly with Los Angeles Opera, Long Beach Opera, Opera Santa Barbara, California Philharmonic, and Redlands Symphony.
Ms. Sinha’s 2019-20 season began with a return to the Los Angeles Opera as Ruth in Invisible for the Eurydice Found Festival, as well as a Mind and Music workshop and concert with Renée Fleming. She has been featured throughout the development of The Industry’s critically acclaimed Sweet Land, workshopping the piece as Hera and Ensemble and premiering the opera as Hera and Drum. She has been in high demand as a mezzo-soprano and alto soloist, performing the Prokofiev Alexander Nevsky Cantata (Azusa Symphony Orchestra and Chorale), Mozart Vesperae solennes de confessore (Joanna Medawar Nachef Singers at the James R. Armstrong Theatre) and Mass in C (Palisades Symphony), and Saint-Saëns Oratorio de Noël and Handel Messiah (Music at Westwood series).
In the 2018-19 season, Ms. Sinha sang Filipneva in Eugene Onegin (Opera Santa Barbara), recitals at Los Angeles Children’s Hospital (Los Angeles Opera) and Greystone Mansion in Beverly Hills, and as alto soloist in the Mozart Requiem (Music at Westwood series). She closed her summer with the wildly successful premiere of Gunfight at the Not-So-OK Saloon at the 2019 Hollywood Fringe Festival, creating the role of Netty in the Best of Fringe and Producers Award-winning musical by Brooke deRosa, and performing the role of Ella in flamenco opera Romance Sonambulo at the LA Live Theater.
Ms. Sinha began the 2017-18 season with The Hubble Cantata by Paola Prestini (Los Angeles Opera and Beth Morrison Projects), followed by premiering the roles of Lily and Our Lady in Golden: A New Musical by Paula Cizmar and Grammy Award-winning composer Nathan Wang for the Paderewski Cycle Competition. As a concert artist, Ms. Sinha performed Dvorak’s Stabat Mater (Palisades Symphony Orchestra), Beethoven's Ninth Symphony and Bernstein selections (California Philharmonic), and was the alto soloist for the Bach Magnificat, Handel Messiah, and Dvorak Mass in D (Music at Westwood series). Ms. Sinha returned to Los Angeles Opera as the Old Lady in Candide for the Opera for Educators series, in recitals for City of Hope and with Renee Fleming for Alzheimer's Greater Los Angeles, and as Featured Ensemble in Jack Perla’s Jonah and the Whale. Ms. Sinha was also seen as Madame de la Grande Bouche alongside the original Broadway cast’s Susan Egan as Belle in Beauty and the Beast (5 Star Theatricals).
Prior season highlights include The Cunning Little Vixen and La Rondine (Opera Santa Barbara), the title role of La Cenerentola (Repertory Opera Company), Amneris in Aida (Marina Del Rey Symphony's Summer Concerts series), The Mother in Amahl and the Night Visitors (Malibu Coast Chamber Opera at Pepperdine Center for the Arts), Rosina in Il Barbiere di Siviglia and Prince Orlofsky in Die Fledermaus (Repertory Opera Company), and alto soloist in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony (San Bernadino Symphony Orchestra) and Handel’s Messiah Sing Along (Music at Westwood series). Ms. Sinha made company debuts as La maestra della novizie in Suor Angelica with Opera Santa Barbara, Suzuki in Madama Butterfly with Marina del Rey Concerts, and Mrs. Ott in Susannah with Opera Pasadena.
Ms. Sinha was the first prize winner of the Franz Liszt International Competition in 2012 and the winner of two additional International Prizes from the same organization in 2014, including a special award for “Best Vocal Interpretation of a Work by Franz Liszt” for premiering a newly discovered work by Franz Liszt, reprising this performance at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington D.C. Ms. Sinha was a winner of the Hollywood Opera Reading Club Vocal Scholarship Competition and the recipient of scholarships from Opera Buffs and Celestial Opera. In 2013 and 2014, she was a Marc and Eva Stern Fellow at Songfest, where she worked closely with William Bolcom, John Musto, Jake Heggie, Libby Larsen, Susanne Mentzer, Margo Garrett, and Martin Katz.
Ms. Sinha is frequently called on by the Los Angeles Opera as both a singer and a teaching artist, collaborating on community projects with Alzheimer’s Greater Los Angeles, Rancho Los Amigos, Urban Voices, Los Angeles Children’s Hospital and City of Hope, and for in-school education programming. She is a teaching artist with Street Symphony and Urban Voices Project. Driven by a deep personal connection to memory care and dementia support through her father, Ms. Sinha also sings for Songs by Heart, an organization that provides singers to memory care unit in Los Angeles.
Ms. Sinha’s upcoming engagements include a return to Opera Santa Barbara as Gertrude in Roméo et Juliette and two reprisals from her successes of the 2018-19 season, Netty in Gunfight at the Not-So-OK Saloon at the McCadden Place Theatre and Ella in Romance Sonambulo with Mojacar Flamenco at the El Portal Theater.
Photography: Suzanne Vinnik | Clothing: by VINNIK