Colleen Johnson

A mezzo-soprano from St. Louis, MO, Colleen also plays piano and guitar. After beginning piano lessons at the age of seven, she began voice lessons with Kathleen Balassi at the age of thirteen. Later, while a student at Cor Jesu Academy, she studied with Lisa A. Campbell at Washington University. In high school she participated in show choir, concert choir and campus ministry choir, and she performed in the district honors choir as well as the Missouri State Music Festival at the University of Missouri at Columbia. One of her passions is musical theater, and she has performed across Missouri: in the Municipal Opera of Saint Louis, for the Mid-America Theater Company, and-- last summer--in the role of the narrator in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, a summer stock production of the Whitecliff Summer Playhouse.

At the University of Dayton Colleen studies voice with Alice Hotopp and has given both a Junior and Senior voice recital. For two years she has acted as a mentor for declared first-year music majors in the course ASI 150 "The First-Year Experience," she tutors students in music theory, and she has participated in Celebration Vocal Transit, Hands in Harmony, Ebony Heritage Singers, and the UD Dance Ensemble. Last year, fall she premiered the role of Nachelle in the Opera Worshop production of Dr. Phillip Magnuson's opera, It Pays to Advertise.

Currently she holds the offices of treasurer for the Music Therapy Club, President for Sigma Alpha Iota and has served as President of the University Chorale . Colleen also directs a Campus Ministry choir for the 8:30 pm Sunday mass.

Colleen looks forward to a career in music therapy, specializing in geriatrics, and eventually to an administrative position.

Listen to Colleen Johnson, accompanied by Elizabeth Dallman sing some of Franz Schubert's Die Blumensprache (37 sec., 288K .au) on January 31, 1997 in Sears Recital Hall.