Joyce Castle

Joyce Castle (born Lillian Joyce Malicky; January 17, 1939) is an American mezzo-soprano and voice teacher. She has had an international career in operas, musicals, and concerts that has spanned eight decades from the late 1950s into the 2020s. While her repertoire embraces a wide range of musical periods, she is closely associated with contemporary operas, often performing in new works or 20th / 21st century stage works. She was featured on the front cover of Opera Monthly magazine in November 1988. The accompanying feature article on her described her as a performer who "specializes in portraying nuts, mamas, lesbians, nymphomaniacs, witches, and men". Critical commentary of her career has emphasized her strength at embodying powerfully believable and widely diverse characters ranging from tragic to humorous with often scene-stealing impact. Castle was born in Beaumont, Texas, and grew up in Golden, Colorado, and Baldwin City, Kansas. A graduate of University of Kansas and the Eastman School of Music, she began working professionally while studying at both institutions. Her stage debut was in Dallas in 1958 as a member of the chorus in stock theatre, and her professional opera debut in a leading part was as Lucia in Mascagni's Cavalleria rusticana with the Opera Theatre of Rochester in 1962. In the 1960s she was a regular performer with the Chautauqua Opera and Syracuse Symphony Orchestra, and was a member of the early music ensemble Ars Antiqua. From 1969 to 1973, she performed frequently with the San Francisco Opera's Western Opera Theatre, and in 1970 sang with that organization's main company as Siebel in Gounod's Faust in what was her first appearance with a major opera company in a leading role. She was married to the sculptor Wendell Castle, and later to tenor Bruce Brewer, in 1971. Castle and Brewer periodically performed together during their marriage, and moved to Paris, France in 1973. Castle lived in France for approximately ten years and worked in Europe as an opera and concert singer. She was a frequent performer in broadcasts of operas recorded for Radio France during this part of her career. Castle returned to the United States and became a regular performer with the New York City Opera (NYCO) at the invitation of Beverly Sills. She sang with this company with intermittent regularity from 1983 through 2009, serving as the NYCO's leading character mezzo. She also performed with the Metropolitan Opera in many productions from 1986 to 1999. She has worked as a guest artist with many opera companies, mostly in the United States with organizations like the Seattle Opera, Glimmerglass Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Washington National Opera, and Santa Fe Opera, but also abroad. In her later career she performed several roles with the Des Moines Metro Opera, most recently portraying the Countess in Tchaikovsky's The Queen of Spades in 2021 at the age of 82. It was the 140th role of her career. She taught on the voice faculty of the University of Kansas as a distinguished professor from 2001 until her retirement in 2023. She sang her farewell concert at the age of 84.

Menotti: The Medium - 2000-01-01T00:00:00.000000Z

Menotti: The Medium - 2000-01-01T00:00:00.000000Z

Similar Artists