Raphaela Papadakis

Raphaela Papadakis studied with Janice Chapman on the Opera Course at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, where her roles included Tytania in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Aurore in Massenet’s Le portrait du Manon, and Susanna in Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro.

Her other operatic roles include Gretel Hansel and Gretel for Clonter Opera, Dido (cover)at l’Opéra de Dijon, Pamina with Hampstead Garden Opera, and Branghien in Frank Martin’sLe vin herbé with Ardente Opera, as well as Dido Dido and Aeneas, Lauretta GianniSchicchi, La Marchande Les Mamelles de Tirésias, and the title role in Holst’s Savitri for Cambridge University Opera. Before studying at the Guildhall, she was a choral scholar at Clare College, Cambridge, where she gained a first class Honours Degree in English Literature, graduating in 2009.

Raphaela was a finalist in the London Handel Competition and won the York Early Music Festival Prize. She is also the winner of the Association of English Singers and Speakers Courtney Kenny Award 2011 and the Guildhall English Song Competition 2010, and was a finalist in the Jackdaws Awards 2010 at the Wigmore Hall. Last year, she was awarded a place on the inaugural Internationale Meistersinger Akademie, which took her to Neumarkt, Germany in the summer for six weeks of intensive study under renowned international teachers and artists, including Edith Wiens, Malcolm Martineau, Brian Zeger, Siegfried Jerusalem and Rudolf Piernay.

Raphaela is just as happy on the concert platform as she is on the stage. Recent highlights include performances of Schoenberg’s melodrama Pierrot Lunaire in Cambridge, Haydn’s Nelson Mass with the Thomas Tallis Society, Britten’s Les Illuminations in St James’s Piccadilly and Mahler’s Fourth Symphony and Bach’s B Minor Mass in St John’s Smiths Square, London. She also performed Mozart’s Requiem with Stephen Cleobury, the Choir of King’s College Cambridge, and the Aurora Orchestra in Kings Place, London, in a performance that was streamed live through the Guardian website. Plans for 2012/13 include Haydn’s The Creation with Stephen Cleobury, Pierrot Lunaire at Sutton House, London, and performances in the London Handel Festival and the York Early Music Festival.