Madeleine Francesca Keane wins The American Prize in Voice, 2023
Madeleine Francesca Keane of Wauwatosa WI is the 2023 winner of The American Prize in Voice in the Women's College/University Art Song Division—The Friedrich & Virginia Schorr Memorial Award. Madeleine was selected from applications reviewed recently from all across the United States.
The American Prize National Nonprofit Competitions in the Performing Arts is the nation's most comprehensive series of contests in the performing arts. The American Prize is unique in scope and structure, designed to recognize and reward the best performing artists, directors, ensembles and composers in the United States at professional, college/university, community and high school levels, based on submitted recordings. Now in its thirteenth year, The American Prize was founded in 2010 and is awarded annually in many areas of the performing arts. Thousands of artists from all fifty states have derived benefit from their participation in the contests of The American Prize, representing literally hundreds of communities and arts organizations across the nation. Information about the 2023-24 season of contests is available on the website: (http://theamericanprize.org)
Link to official announcement: http://theamericanprize.blogspot.com/2023/08/national-winners-women-in-art-song.html
The artist provided this biographical sketch:
Soprano Madeleine Keane is a student at the Manhattan School of Music and has been singing since she made her debut at the age of eight with the Florentine Opera. She has won numerous regional, national, and international awards and scholarships and has sung in renowned venues across the country, including Carnegie Hall, Summerfest, The National Opera Center, and Walt Disney World. This past summer, she made her Italian debut, singing at historic venues including Basilica di San Crisogono (Rome), Teatro Angelo Mariani (Sant’Agata Feltria), Piazza San Francesco (Ravenna), and Teatro Vittoria (Pennabilli). In April, she sang the role of Belinda in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas at the Manhattan School of Music. In May 2023, Madeleine Keane graduated from the Manhattan School of Music with a Bachelor of Music in Vocal Arts. She will continue her studies at The Guildhall School of Music in London where she will attain both a Masters of Music and a Masters of Performance in the Vocal Arts program. She will attend Guildhall on a scholarship.
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The American Prize in Vocal Performance—Friedrich and Virginia Schorr Memorial Awards honors the memory of the greatest Wagnerian baritone of his age, Friedrich Schorr, who commanded the operatic stage between the world wars, and his wife, Virginia Schorr, who taught studio voice at the Manhattan School of Music and the Hartt School of Music for nearly fifty years. The Prize recognizes and rewards the best performances by classically trained vocalists in America, based on submitted applications.
Additional information about the competitions on the website: www.theamericanprize.org
For runners-up in this category and for additional winners already announced in 2023 in other competitions, please follow this link:
http://theamericanprize.blogspot.com/
Winners of The American Prize receive cash prizes, professional adjudication and regional, national and international recognition based on recorded performances. In addition to monetary rewards and written evaluations from judges, winners are profiled on The American Prize websites, where links will lead to video and audio excerpts of artist performances.
THE AMERICAN PRIZE—History & Judges
The American Prize National Nonprofit Competitions in the Performing Arts grew from the belief that a great deal of excellent music being made in this country goes unrecognized and unheralded, not only in our major cities, but all across the country: in schools and churches, in colleges and universities, and by community and professional musicians.
With the performing arts in America marginalized like never before, The American Prize seeks to fill the gap that leaves excellent artists and ensembles struggling for visibility and viability. The American Prize recognizes and rewards the best America produces, without bias against small city versus large, or unknown artist versus well-known.
David Katz is the chief judge of The American Prize. Professional conductor, award-winning composer, playwright, actor and arts advocate, he is author of MUSE of FIRE, theacclaimed one-man play about the art of conducting. Joining Katz in selecting winners of The American Prize is a panel of judges as varied in background and experience as we hope the winners of The American Prize will be. Made up of distinguished musicians representing virtually every region of the country, the group includes professional vocalists, conductors, composers and pianists, tenured professors, and orchestra, band and choral musicians.
“Most artists may never win a Grammy award, or a Pulitzer, or a Tony, or perhaps even be nominated,” Katz said, “but that does not mean that they are not worthy of recognition and reward. Quality in the arts is not limited to a city on each coast, or to the familiar names, or only to graduates of a few schools. It is on view all over the United States, if you take the time to look for it. The American Prize exists to encourage and herald that excellence.”
By shining a light on nationally recognized achievement, winners of The American Prize receive world-class bragging rights to use in promotion right at home. “If The American Prize helps build careers, or contributes to local pride, or assists with increasing the audience for an artist or ensemble, builds the donor base, or stimulates opportunities or recruitment for winning artists and ensembles, then we have fulfilled our mission,” Katz said.
The American Prize is administered by Hat City Music Theater, Inc., a 501(c)3 non-profit performing arts organization based in Danbury, Connecticut. To receive "On TAP," the free e-newsletter of The American Prize, please sign up using this link: Newsletter Sign-up We never share email addresses with anyone, and you can opt out at any time.
