Cincinnati-based Mezzo-Soprano Lauren McAllister recently performed the role of Marta in Queen City Opera’s production of Iolanta, Madame de Volanges in Susa’s The Dangerous Liaisons with Vegas City Opera, and sang the mezzo solo in Corigliano’s Fern Hill with the Akron Symphony Orchestra. Lauren appeared as the Alto Soloist in Beethoven 9 with the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra and Queen City Opera. With Conspirare, she premiered and recorded Mark Buller’s Requiem in the Light. Lauren also premiered composer Ben Owen’s reimagined 24 Italian Art Songs and Arias this past year. Upcoming performances include a premiere of Joby Talbot’s Piedra de Sol with Conspirare, soloist in Bach’s Easter Oratorio, soloist in the Pergolesi Stabat Mater, and premieres with ensembles in New York and Seattle (details to be announced soon). 

Lauren performs regularly with a variety of choral ensembles, including Conspirare, the Cincinnati Vocal Arts Ensemble, the Bach Ensemble of Saint Thomas, and Heri et Hodie. Lauren is an artist on four Grammy®-nominated recordings for Best Choral Performance: Conspirare’s House of Belonging, The Singing Guitar, The Hope of Loving , and the PaTRAM Institute Singers’ Sander: The Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom. 

Operatic highlights include Vesta in the world premiere of Fierce by William Menefield and librettist Sheila Williams (Cincinnati Opera), Queen of the Virtues in Hildegard von Bingen’s Ordo Virtutum (Collegium Cincinnati), Laura (Iolanta, Queen City Opera), Lazuli (l'Étoile, Sin City Opera), Melanto (Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria, Opera Louisiane), Orlofsky (Die Fledermaus, Undercroft Opera), Courtier and Maid cover (The Witches of Venice, Opera Saratoga), and La Perichole (title role, Sin City Opera). As a soloist, Lauren has performed a variety of Bach cantatas with the Bach Ensemble of Saint Thomas and the Bach Society of Dayton, appeared in staged productions of the Pergolesi Stabat Mater and Bach’s Saint John Passion, and debuted with the Lubbock Symphony for their Chamber Sound! Series with works by Jennifer Jolley and David T. Little. Other notable appearances as a soloist include the Bach Ascension Oratorio, BWV 1083, and Bach’s B Minor Mass, Dvorak’s Stabat Mater, Vivaldi’s Gloria, Handel’s Messiah, Fern Hill (Corigliano), A Child of Our Time (Tippett), Ode to Common Things (Ratcliff), Considering Matthew Shepard by Craig Hella Johnson, and the US premiere of the Telemann Brockes Passion.

Lauren earned her Master of Music degree in Voice Performance from the University of Cincinnati-College Conservatory of Music (CCM). She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Voice Performance from the Eastman School of Music. Lauren was the 2015 Nebraska District winner of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, was a finalist in the 2012 Jessie Kneisel Lieder Competition, and won first place in the 2011 Syracuse Civic Morning Musicals Competition.