Mezzo-soprano Ruth L. Carver possesses a "dark, romantic voice" (Muenchner Merkur) and loves exploring the musical literature of opera, oratorio, and song. Miss Carver is a graduate of Vassar College, where she received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Victorian Studies, and received her Master of Music in voice performance from the Peabody Conservatory of Music. She has studied voice with Louise Urban, Ah Hong, and Viviane Thomas and opera with Drew Minter. In cello, she studied with Luis Garcia-Renart and Sophie Shao.
Miss Carver’s many operatic roles include Miss Todd in The Old Maid and the Thief, Die Hexe in Haensel und Gretel, and Bianca in The Rape of Lucretia. Other appearances include Mrs. Anderssen ("A Little Night Music" by Stephen Sondheim), Charity ("The Rite of the Virtues" by Hildegard von Bingen), Cornelia ("Giulio Cesare" by Handel) and the Voice of the Mother ("Les Contes d'Hoffman" by Offenbach) with the Vassar Opera Workshop. She performed the Third Lady ("Die Zauberfloete" by Mozart) and Frau Van Tassel ("The Legend of Sleepy Hollow") at the Shaker Mountain Opera Festival. In 2005, she worked with Nico and Carol Castel, performing Olga ("Eugene Onegin") at the New York Opera Studio.
She has been invited to sing in masterclasses with Jeanette Favaro-Reuter, Denes Striny, Amy Burton, and Lorraine Hunt Lieberson. In the summer of 2007 she was a featured singer in the Elysium-between two continents festival in Bernried, Germany. Exciting engagements for 2008 included a concert at the Palazzo Ricci in Montepulciano, Italy, and the role of The Witch in Hansel and Gretel at Schloss Henfenfeld, Germany.
In 2009, she appeared in recitals in Baltimore and starred as Miss Todd in The Old Maid and the Thief in Steamboat Springs, Colorado. She also performed in scenes from Hansel and Gretel, The Marriage of Figaro, and The Ballad of Baby Doe, directed by noted opera performer and director Richard Crittenden. As a guest artist with OperaFest at the University of Mary Washington, she sang Prince Orlofsky (Die Fledermaus), Mistress Page (The Merry Wives of Windsor), and Augusta (The Ballad of Baby Doe).
In 2009-2010, she joined the premiere season of Repertory Opera Theater of Washington as Romeo in Bellini's masterpiece I Capuleti e i Montecchi and Bradamante in Handel's Alcina. Miss Carver also took part in Chesapeake Concert Opera’s production of Così fan tutte.
The summer of 2010 featured travel to Fairbanks, Alaska to sing Cherubino in Le nozze di Figaro with the Fairbanks Summer Arts Festival. Ruth recently portrayed Mere Marie in Poulenc's opera Dialogues des Carmelites. In the spring of 2011 she joined the Wichita Grand Opera's Young Artist Program., covering Suzuki (Madama Butterfly), singing Olga Kromov (The Merry Widow), and understuding the Marquise of Birkinfeld (La fille du regiment).She was a member of the the 2011 Opera in the Ozarks troupe, performing Marcellina in Le nozze di Figaro and Meg March in Mark Adamo's Little Women. She was also invited back to the Emerald City Opera Artist Institute for a special appearance as the Mother in Hansel and Gretel.
News about the Conservatory Crossroads concert
Ruth was selected to participate in an exciting project organized by the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance, highlighting the work of composition faculty and students. She sang in semi-staged excerpts from Pulitzer Prize-winning opera Madame White Snake by Zhou Long, which The Kansas City Star called "the highlight of the evening." The concert was then taken on the road to the alternative concert space (le) poisson rouge in New York City. "Ruth L. Carver added dramatic power and amber-hued tension in trouser roles as human and snake." (Kansas City Star)
Review of Liszt recital
Ruth recently organized a recital of Lieder by Liszt and his Contemporaries as part of UMKC's Liszt 200 series, celebrating the 200th birthday of the great composer.
Her performance "added much in the way of nuance and poise" and her singing "displayed a truly rich and variegated tone; any conductor within 200 miles looking for a Mahler mezzo needs to get on the line to UMKC, stat." (kcmetropolis.org)
Read the full review here.