Canadian lyric coloratura soprano Vania Chan received her Master of Music in Classical Voice from the Manhattan School of Music in New York, and graduated Summa Cum Laude from York University, Toronto, receiving a B.F.A. with Specialized Honours in Music.

Vania had her Carnegie Hall debut in Weill Recital Hall, performing as a first prize winner in the Barry Alexander International Vocal Competition in New York.

She premiered the role of “The Light Moon” in the Dora Award Winning opera “The Lesson of Da Ji” by composer Alice Ping Yee Ho and librettist Marjorie Chan, presented by Toronto Masque Theatre. Vania’s voice can be heard on the CD recording of the same opera (Centre Discs, Naxos), singing the roles of “The Light Moon” and “Ming” the maid. The recording received a critic’s choice review in Opera News, New York.

Performance highlights include the role of Madame Herz in Mozart’s The Impresario, the goddess Diane in Rameau’s Hippolyte et Aricie both with VOICEBOX: Opera in Concert, Princess Mi in Lehár The Land of Smiles with Toronto Operetta Theatre, the role of the Ad Exec in Soundstreams’ presentation of Brian Current’s Airline Icarus: A New Opera, the soprano role in Alice Ho’s Venom of Love, produced by Little Pear Garden Collective, and more recently, a leading role in Purcell’s The Fairy Queen.

Vania was the winner of the “City of Brandon Award” at the 2008 Eckhardt Gramatté Vocal Competition, for her interpretation of the commissioned cycle, Jocelyn Morlock’s Involuntary Love Songs, which was broadcast by the Canadian Broadcasting Company.

She made her European debut through the “Elysium Between Two Continents: International Summer Academy”, in Bernried, Germany.

She has sung with several performance companies in New York, including Gateway Classical Music Society, the New York Opera Forum, Opus Opera NY, and Opera Manhattan Repertory Theatre Inc. She also sang with the Berkshire Bach Society in Great Barrington, Massachusetts.

In Canada, Vania has performed with Summer Opera Lyric Theatre, Toronto Operetta Theatre, Toronto Masque Theatre, TrypTych, Halifax Summer Opera Festival, and Opera by Request. She was the soprano soloist with Chorus Hamilton, the York University Concert Choir, Tryptych Chamber Choir Ensemble, and Donway Covenant United Church Choir. Vania has been featured in young artist recitals with the Barrie Colours of Music Festival, and with Visual and Performing Arts Newmarket.

Her operatic roles include Zerbinetta (Strauss’ Ariadne auf Naxos), Cleopatra (Handel’s Giulio Cesare), Olympia (Offenbach’s Les Contes d’Hoffmann), Susanna (Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro), Marie (Donizetti’s La Fille du Régiment), Lucia (Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor), Gretel (Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel), Nanetta (Verdi’s Falstaff), Armida (Handel’s Rinaldo), Morgana (Handel’s Alcina) and Anne Trulove (Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress).