“clear and elegant of voice… completely engaging” (ClevelandClassical.com)

Elana Bell is an American mezzo-soprano currently based in New York City. She recently completed her Master of Musical Arts degree at the Yale School of Music, where she studied with Adriana Zabala.

She started out 2024 in Sarasota, FL as an Apprentice Artist with Sarasota Opera, where she appeared in the ensembles of Carmen, Lucia di Lammermoor, and Luisa Miller, as well as in several concerts throughout the season. She will join Aspen Music Festival this summer as a Studio Artist Fellow, covering Cherubino in Le nozze di Figaro and performing as a soloist in Matthew Aucoin’s new staged song cycle Music for New Bodies. 

Her 2022-23 season encompassed three role debuts with Yale Opera: Der Komponist in Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos, Female Chorus in Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia, and Isolier in Rossini’s Le comte Ory. In the summer of 2022, Elana was a Vocal Fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center in Lenox, MA, where she was featured in many recitals and concerts, including the Festival of Contemporary Music (performing Erin Graham’s Manual) and the Bach Cantata Project under the direction of John Harbison. Earlier that year, she performed the title role in Missy Mazzoli’s chamber opera Song from the Uproar: The Lives and Deaths of Isabelle Eberhardt at Yale’s Schwarzman Center, as well as Ruggiero in Handel’s Alcina with Yale Opera. 

In the 2020-2021 season, Elana was an Apprentice Artist with Des Moines Metro Opera, where she study-covered the role of Junon in Rameau’s Platée and sang in the ensembles of Platée and Tchaikovsky’s The Queen of Spades. In February 2020, she covered the title role of Ravel’s L’enfant et les sortilèges with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Louis Langrée.

Elana earned her Master of Music degree from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, where she was featured as the title role in Cavalli’s La Calisto as well as Háta in Smetana’s The Bartered Bride. In Cincinnati, she also sang with the professional Vocal Arts Ensemble and served as a cantorial soloist at the historic Isaac M. Wise Temple.

Favorite additional roles include Cherubino in Le nozze di Figaro (Music Academy of the West, Oberlin Opera Theater, Pittsburgh Festival Opera) and the title roles in Massenet’s Cendrillon (Oberlin Opera Theater) and Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea (Oberlin in Italy).

Always excited to perform new music, Elana recently premiered a new work by Aaron Levin as a part of Yale’s initiative, SongLab. With New Music New Haven, she has sung Mama in a concert excerpt from Joel Thompson’s opera The Snowy Day, as well as Levin’s set In Prayer for singer, guitarist, viola, and percussion. She has performed Caroline Shaw’s Cant voi l’aube with string quartet at Music Academy of the West, as well as George Benjamin’s Upon Silence for mezzo and seven strings with the Oberlin Contemporary Music Ensemble. 

In 2023, Elana was named the Eastern Region winner of the NATS Artist Awards. She was a finalist in the 2020 Carolyn Bailey Argento Competition sponsored by the National Opera Association, and has also won accolades from the James Toland Vocal Arts Competition (Oakland, CA) and the Tri-State College Vocal Competition (sponsored by the Opera Guild of Dayton). She is a recipient of the Yale School of Music Alumni Prize, as well as the Margot Bos Stambler Professional Development Award and the Pi Kappa Lambda Musicianship Award from Oberlin Conservatory. In addition to a Bachelor of Music, Elana also holds a Bachelor of Arts in Art History from Oberlin College, where she graduated Phi Beta Kappa.