Simone Vigilante is lauded as a “beautiful dramatic soprano capable of some awesome fireworks”
(Asheville Citizen-Times).
Ms. Vigilante has lived in the Asheville area since 2001 and is a founding member of Opera Creations. She has sung numerous leading roles with Asheville Lyric Opera, from Mozart to Strauss to Menotti, as well as musical theater such as Bloody Mary (South Pacific) and Mother Abbess (The Sound of Music). Additional roles include Sister Rose (Dead Man Walking) for The Modern American Music Project and Katisha (The Mikado), Miss Silverpeal (Mozart’s Impresario), and Ruth (Pirates of Penzance) for Opera Creations.
Born in Rochester, New York, Ms. Vigilante attended the Eastman School of Music beginning her studies in piano and voice. She earned vocal and opera performance degrees from the University of North Carolina School of the Arts (BM) and Indiana University of Bloomington (MM), where she worked primarily with the world-famous and Classical Singer Magazine’s 2010 teacher of the year Virginia Zeani.
She has appeared in recitals and competitions, with opera companies and orchestras, throughout the United States, France, Spain, Austria and Italy. Recent highlights include a lecture-recital at the NC Museum of Art where Classical Voice of North Carolina noted “Vigilante provided the pizazz” and her solo CD release, Love, Look Away. This recording showcases her diverse talents in singing various genres including opera, classical, musical theater, gospel, and folk song through a dynamic collaboration with pianist David Troy Francis.
As a soloist of choral and orchestral works, Ms. Vigilante performs regularly with Asheville Choral Society (Vaughan Williams’ Hodie, Handel’s Messiah, Brubeck’s Mass: To Hope! A Celebration and Theofanidis’ The Here and Now), Asheville Symphony, and Asheville Symphony Chorus (Brahms’ Ein deutsches Requiem, Mozart’s Requiem, Duruflé’s Requiem).
She serves as a regular Cantor/Soloist at St. Mary’s Church and is a popular vocal instructor and master class clinician at UNC-Asheville, Academy for the Arts at First Baptist Church, and La Bella Voce Studio of Simone Vigilante.
