Page 303 - FINAL_Guildhall Media Highlights 2019-2020 Coverage Book

After Guildhall, Romaniw was offered places on young artist schemes run by the Royal
Opera, Houston Grand Opera and the Metropolitan in New York; she eventually opted

for Houston, “because I felt that it offered me the most comprehensive map: they were

able to pinpoint exactly where they saw me going”.

Romaniw’s professional debut was as the wayward Maliella in Wolf-Ferrari’s The

Jewels of the Madonna at Opera Holland Park in 2013, and she has gone on to enjoy a

long and mutually rewarding relationship with the popular Kensington festival.

“Opera Holland Park was the one company unafraid to take a chance on me. They took

a massive risk giving me a role like Maliella when I was 25, but ever since I won the
Ferrier Competition, [OHP’s director of opera] James Clutton had persisted in trying to

get me to come.”

“Both he and [OHP’s outgoing general director] Mike Volpe have always wanted to see
me develop at Holland Park. They’ve given me roles that have challenged me, as well as

roles I particularly wanted to do, like Iolanta. Lisa in Tchaikovsky’s The Queen of

Spades I did find challenging, but I’m glad I did it there first, because they are a

wonderful company, and really like a kind of family.”

That same year – 2016 – was when the soprano moved into the top league as one of the

outstanding British singers of her generation. “It began when I sang the Foreign

Princess in Rusalka for Scottish Opera, and then I went on to sing Tatyana in Eugene

Onegin at Garsington.” Her relationships with both companies have continued to

thrive.

“Scottish Opera has been keen to give me roles in a nurturing manner, so I started with

the Foreign Princess, but I’ve also done Tatyana, as well as Suzel in Mascagni’s L’Amico

Fritz in its Sunday concert series. My most recent role there was Tosca.”

Her relationship with ENO began when Michelle Williams moved down south from

Scottish Opera as head of casting. She and ENO’s music director Martyn Brabbins

offered Romaniw Mimì in La Bohème, then Butterfly, and she’s hoping to sing Tosca

there in the future.