Release date: October 10, 2007
Singing sensation, breast cancer survivor opens Premiere Series
Contact: Cheryl Anderson Brown, Assistant Director of Public Relations
770-499-3417 or cbrown@kennesaw.edu
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Sylvia McNair |
KENNESAW, Ga.—Former Metropolitan Opera star Sylvia McNair will open the 2007-2008 Premiere Series at Kennesaw State University at 8 p.m. on Oct. 20 with a performance in the newly opened Dr. Bobbie Bailey and Family Performance Center. Tickets are $40. For more information, call the KSU Box Office at 770-423-6650 or order tickets online.
McNair will also be teaching a master class on Oct. 19 from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. in the Bailey Performance Center. The class is free and open to the public.
Sylvia. Singer. Survivor.
Sylvia McNair's 25-year career as one of the world's leading singers has brought her two Grammy Awards, over 70 recordings and worldwide accolades, but she values her most recent success above all others: She Is A Survivor. Diagnosed with breast cancer in 2006, Sylvia persevered through five major surgeries, months of chemo and radiation, all while performing every place from New York to Florida, joining the of the prestigious Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University and never losing hope. She's living large and singing as beautifully as ever.
There's another S word, add "Segue" to the list because SurvivorSingerSylvia has segued from opera and oratorio to the Great American Songbook, the music with which she feels most at home. Now, instead of singing "V'adoro pupille" as Cleopatra to Julius Caesar on the stage of the Metropolitan Opera, she's singing "Embraceable You" to rave reviews. Barrymore Lawrence Scherer in the Wall Street Journal wrote (March 2007): "In recent years, such first-rank classical artists as Renee Fleming and Sylvia McNair have proved adept at jazz vocals. The idiom is in their blood" while Rex Reed, of McNair's Algonquin Oak Room debut wrote, "Her phrasing is exemplary. Her modulations are inspired. I could get used to this kind of ecstasy."
Since 1982, Sylvia has performed with almost every major American and European orchestra and opera company, including The Met, Chicago Lyric Opera, the Salzburg Festival, the New York Philharmonic, the San Francisco Opera, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Philharmonics of Vienna and Berlin, working with an array of the world's most prominent conductors, including Masur, Ozawa, Slatkin, Marriner, Previn and the late Robert Shaw, the musician she credits for giving her the important opportunities that started her career. For her, the highlights of her career include singing for Pope John Paul II, Hillary Rodham Clinton and the US Supreme Court by invitation of Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. A native of Mansfield, Ohio, Sylvia has received honorary doctorates from Westminster College and Indiana University and the Ohio Governor's Award for Outstanding Achievement in Arts and Entertainment.
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A member of the 35-unit University System of Georgia, Kennesaw State University is a comprehensive‚ residential institution with a growing student population approaching 20‚000 from 132 countries. The third largest state university in Georgia‚ Kennesaw State offers more than 60 graduate and undergraduate degrees‚ including a new Doctorate of Education in Leadership.
The KSU College of the Arts is one of only four Georgia institutions to have achieved full national accreditation for all of its arts programs.