Madeleine Pierard

Lyric Soprano Madeleine Pierard was born in Napier in 1981 and began her musical life as a pianist and chorister, becoming a member of The New Zealand Youth Choir, The Tudor Consort and Voices New Zealand.

In 1999 she became an Associate of Trinity College London (pianoforte), and in 2003 graduated with a Bachelor of Music (Composition) from Victoria University. In 2005 Pierard won the Lexus Song Quest and was received an Arts Foundation of New Zealand New Generation Award in 2008. She completed her MMus in 2009 at the Benjamin Britten Opera School at the Royal College of Music.

Performing contemporary works is a particular interest of Pierard’s. In 2006 alongside the Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra she premiered ‘Symphony No. 2’ by New Zealand composer Ross Harris. In 2009, with the NZSO, she recorded an album of works by New Zealand-born Edinburgh-based composer Lyell Cresswell.

Pierard has performed extensively on the concert platform throughout New Zealand and the United Kingdom. She has performed recitals with notable New Zealand singers Dame Kiri Te Kanawa and Jonathan Lemalu in Jersey and London, and in 2008 appeared as a soloist on tour with the NZSO in China. She also appears regularly as an oratorio soloist at St Martin-in-the-Fields.

Pierard is currently employed by The Royal Opera in London as a Jette Parker Young Artist.