Ali McGregor

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© Claudio Raschella

Soprano


Next Victorian Opera performance

Yma Sumac in Yma Sumac: The Peruvian Songbird, June 2020

Last 3 major performances 

  • Lorelei B, Lorelei, Victorian Opera, 2018
  • Yma Sumac, Yma Sumac: The Peruvian Songbird, Adelaide Cabaret Festival, 2018
  • Featured Guest, Michael Feinstein’s: Songs of Harold Arlen, Carnegie Hall, NYC, 2017

Education/Training

  • Australian National University B(Mus) (1991-1993), Royal Northern College of Music B(Mus) and Post Graduate diploma 1994-1998
  • Teachers: Jeanette Russell in Australia and Teresa Cahill in UK

Age when you started singing

Started taking lessons at school when I was 14.

Favourite opera or musical 

I can’t go past La Bohème for classic romance, Sweeney Todd for musical theatre realness, but in all honesty Victorian Opera’s Lorelei was the most thrilling, genuine piece of musical tinged theatre I’ve ever been involved in.

Favourite opera or musical role to perform

As above - Musetta in Bohème, the Sweeney Todd Chorus (“SWEEEEENEY!!!!), Lorelei B. 

A fun fact not many people know about you 

I am an expert at putting together IKEA furniture. It is my superpower.

What do you like to sing in the shower? 

I do most of my best work in the shower. I sing EVERYTHING in there. That and the car are my favourite places to practice.

Where’s the strangest place you’ve performed? 

Strange places I have sung far outweigh the normal I’m afraid… in a fibre-glass orange in Opera Australia’s Love of Three Oranges when it caught on fire during a tech rehearsal; a houseboat on the Thames; in a mud-filled tent at Glastonbury wearing only a tutu, a corset and wellington boots; flying on a swing above a bar in Club Swizzle at the Opera House; a drag club in Helsinki; singing ‘I will Survive’ with Emma Thompson at the London Palladium; singing a lament in a tent to a severed, stuffed fox head that an audience had pulled out of the Thames and placed on the stage; alongside Amanda Palmer in a metal bar at 1am in Edinburgh, filmed by a drone in a Alfa Romeo advert matching the revs with my voice as the car did a hot lap around a Racetrack…

Tell us about your hobbies outside opera. 

IKEA furniture obviously, general DIY, cooking, macramé, random crafting, yoga, graphic design. I am 89% hobby at this point in my life.

Awards

  • Green Room Award - Best supporting role - La Cenerentola Opera Australia, 2005
  • Special Green Room Award for Contribution to Cabaret 2016
  • Nominated for an ARIA award for JAZZAMATAZZ! 2014
  • Editor’s Choice Award, Edinburgh Festivals 2016

Quotes

"Somewhere between opera and pop sits a genre of music called 'Ali McGregor' "


Herald Sun

"Ali McGregor has the kind of silky smooth singing voice that transports you to a different plane, in a way that makes you forget everything you were doing before walking in to the theatre and everything you intended to be doing when you walk out again."


The Scotsman

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Ali McGregor in Victorian Opera's Lorelei. Photo: Pia Johnson