Praised by the Washington Post for her dramatic intensity and vocal ability, soprano Shannon Jennings continues to wow critics and audiences alike. This season, Ms. Jennings sings the title role in Rusalka with Opera Orlando, the title role in Turandot with Gulfshore Opera, and will soon announce performances as Mimì in La bohème, and the title role in Pauline Viardot's Cendrillon. In the 2022-23 season, she performed the role of Mimì in La bohème with Kentucky Opera, and returns to Kentucky this season to perform a solo recital celebrating her Cuban heritage with Spanish-language songs and zarzuela.

 

Her 2021-2022 season included making her house debut as the title role in Tosca with Opera Las Vegas, singing Mimì in La bohème with Newport Classical, and performing Knoxville: Summer of 1915 with the Lancaster Symphony Orchestra. She also covered Beggar Woman in Sweeney Todd at Opera Omaha, sang a recital with Washington Concert Opera and covered Beatrice in Three Decembers at Virginia Opera.

 

In the summer of 2021, she returned to Wolf Trap Opera to sing Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915 in recital, the title role in Viardot’s Cendrillon, and the Beggar Woman in Sweeney Todd. In the 2020-2021 season, Ms. Jennings made her recording debut with Death Waltz Records as a soloist in Oscar-winning composer Michael Giacchino's first solo album, Travelogue Volume 1. She also performed as a soprano soloist with Washington Concert Opera's Centennial Celebration of the Suffragettes, and in place of her debut with Kentucky Opera as Mimì in La bohème (COVID-19 - rescheduled to Fall 2022), she joined the company for digital media performances. In the spring of 2021, she joined Palm Beach Opera, singing Erste Dame in Die Zauberflöte, and covering Latonia Moore as Mimì in La bohème and Ana María Martínez as Nedda in Pagliacci.

 

Ms. Jennings was a 2018 Apprentice Artist with Santa Fe Opera, where she covered soprano Ana María Martínez as Cio-Cio San in Madama Butterfly. As a Resident Artist with Pittsburgh Opera from 2016 to 2018, she sang Giannetta in The Elixir of Love, Aunt Sarah/Iraqi Woman/Shrink in The Long Walk, and Costanza in the rarely seen Handel opera, Richard the Lionheart. Pittsburgh in the Round hailed Ms. Jennings as “a vision… [singing] treacherously difficult music with what seemed to be the greatest of ease and with a voice of beautiful quality and quantity." 

 

Ms. Jennings is an alumna of the Merola Opera Program where The Bay Area Reporter wrote that "her darker sound and clear tone have a blooming quality that easily filled the big opera-house acoustic." Other residencies have included Virginia Opera, Central City Opera, Ash Lawn Opera, the Wolf Trap Opera Studio, and the Mittelsächsisches Theater in Freiberg, Germany, where she began her career performing Pamina in Die Zauberflöte. Ms. Jennings has sung as a soloist with Washington Concert Opera, the Virginia Symphony, the Richmond Symphony, and the Mittelsächsisches Philharmonie. Other highlights include Marguerite in Faust with Annapolis Opera, Fiordiligi in Così fan tutte with Opera Orlando, Josephine in HMS Pinafore with Virginia Opera, Mimì in La bohème with DC Public Opera, and Guinevere in Camelot with Virginia Opera, for which AltDaily praised her as "the perfect blend of beauty and spirit," after she appeared in the role for the detained lead in a nearly sold-out performance.

 

A formidable competitor, Ms. Jennings was a finalist in the 2019 George London Foundation competition, a winner of the 2017 Mildred Miller International Voice Competition, a Capitol District Winner in the 2016-17 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, and a winner of the 2015 Annapolis Opera Vocal Competition. She holds a Bachelor of Music in Vocal Performance from Florida State University.