Felicity Lott

CHELTENHAM SOPRANO

Felicity Lott was born born on May 8, 1947 in Cheltenham. She started with piano lessons at the age of five and at the age of twelve she added another instrument, violin, as well as signing. She studied at Royal Holloway College, London University French and Latin to become an interpreter. In 1969 she took up her singing studies at the Royal Academy of Music.In 1975 she made her début at the English National Opera as Pamina in Mozart’s Magic Flute, in 1976 she took part in the first performance of Henze’s opera We come to the River at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden.

Her operatic repertoire ranges from Handel to Stravinsky, but she has above all built up her formidable international reputation as an interpreter of the great roles of Mozart and Strauss. Her many roles include the Marschallin (Rosenkavalier / Strauss), Countess Madeleine (Capriccio / Strauss), Arabella (Strauss), Christine (Intermezzo / Strauss) Countess Almaviva (Le Nozze Di Figaro / Mozart), Fiordiligi (Cosi Fan Tutte / Mozart), Donna Elvira (Don Giovanni / Mozart), Ellen Orford (Peter Grimes / Britten), The Governess (The Turn Of The Screw / Britten), Lady Billows (Albert Herring / Britten), Louise (Charpentier), Blanche (Les Dialogues des Carmelites / Poulenc) and Elle (La Voix Humaine / Poulenc).

She is also renowned as a concert artist, she has worked with nearly all major orchestras and festivals. She has sung with Vienna Philharmonic and Chicago Symphony Orchestras under Solti, the Munich Philharmonic under Mehta, the London Philharmonic under Haitink, Welser-Moest and Masur, the Concertgebouworkest under Masur, the Suisse Romande and Tonhalle orchestras under Armin Jordan, the Boston Symphony under Previn, the New York Philharmonic under Previn and Masur, the B.B.C. Symphony Orchestra with Sir Andrew Davis in London, Sydney and New York, and the Cleveland Orchestra under Welser-Moest in Cleveland and Carnegie Hall. In Berlin she has sung with the Berlin Philharmonic under Solti and Rattle and the Deutsche Staatskapelle under Philippe Jordan.

She sang at the wedding of HRH Prince Andrew in 1986. In 1990 Felicity Lott was also made a CBE. In 1996 she was created a Dame Commander of the British Empire. In recent years she has become increasingly fond of operetta, playing central roles in Lehar's Merry Widow, Johann Strauss's Die Fledermaus and Offenbach's La Belle Helene.

Dame Felicity Lott still has family links with the town and in 1993 Dame Felicity accepted an invitation to become the President of Cheltenham Choral Society, where her cousin is a long-standing member. In April 1999 she sang the soprano part in the Society’s world premiere performance of the Requiem commissioned by the choir and composed by the Society’s conductor Ian Higginson in honour of Morgan Islwyn Jones, the choir's founder and conductor for 35 years.