Ann McMahon Quintero
A true singing actor, Ann McMahon Quintero has never known a life without an audience to entertain. From her early days as a an instrumentalist, chorister and dancer, she has evolved into a mezzo-soprano who enjoys a career on the operatic and concert stage where her rich voice has been praised for “warm, honeyed tones” (Baltimore Sun), and “fully nuanced” portrayals of characters ranging from Verdi’s Amneris, Azucena and Mistress Quickly to the Old Lady in Candide. In all she does, Ann McMahon Quintero brings to the stage deep intelligence, brilliant artistry and unmatched confidence.
Ms. Quintero’s recent orchestral engagements have included appearances with the Boston Baroque — with whom she frequently performs — as soloist in Mozart’s Requiem, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9.; Haydn’s Requiem in C Minor and in their annual Messiah. She has also sung Messiah with Charlotte and Alabama symphony orchestras and the National Symphony Orchestra. She has performed as soloist for Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 with the Williamsburg and Columbus Symphonies and the Buffalo Philharmonic with Joann Falletta. She recorded Mahler’s Symphony No. 8 under the direction of Maestro Falletta with the Virginia Arts Festival as well.
Nationwide engagements with The Defiant Requiem Foundation performing Hours of Freedom: The Story of the Terezin Composerand the Verdi Requiemhave brought Ms. Quintero to Chicago, Detroit, New York’s Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall, Boston Symphony Hall, She has also performed the Verdi Requiem with the Buffalo Philharmonic, Cathedral Choral Society Washington, Brevard Music Center, Berkshire Choral, Southwest Florida Symphony and the South Bend Symphony.
Also with Berkshire Choral, Ms. Quintero has performed Haydn’s Paukenmesseat Carnegie Hall; Dvořák’s Stabat Mater and Requiem, Vivaldi’s Gloria, and Britten’s Spring Symphony.
Her recent operatic appearances have included The Old Lady (Candide) with Arizona and Portland Opera; Ulrica (Un ballo in maschera) with Austin Lyric Opera, Suor Pazienza (Giordano’s Mese Mariano) with the Spoleto Festival (USA), Mary (Der fliegende Holländer) and Hippolyta (A Midsummer Night’s Dream) with Boston Lyric Opera, Mistress Quickly (Falstaff) with Virginia Opera, Opera Delaware and Opéra de Lausanne; Amneris (Aida) with Annapolis Opera; Azucena (Il trovatore) at both Musica Viva Hong Kong and Opéra Royal de Wallonie and in a concert performance of Guillaume Tell with Opera Orchestra of New York. Her operatic roles with the Boston Baroque have included the title role in Vivaldi’s Juditha Triumphans; Storgé in Handel’s Jephtha and Cornelia in Handel’s Giulio Cesare.
Ms. Quintero made her international operatic debut with New Israeli Opera as La Haine in Gluck’s Armide and returned to the company as Marquise Melibea (Il viaggio a Reims). She sang Baba the Turk (The Rake’s Progress) with Angers Nantes Opera, joined Teatro alla Scala for its production of Lorin Maazel’s 1984; sang Olga Olsen (Street Scene) with Opera Theatre of Saint Louis; Isabella (L’italiana in Algeri) with Palm Beach Opera, Gertrude (Roméo et Juliette) with Toledo Opera; and Glaša (Kátya Kabanová) and Teresa (La sonnambula) with The Santa Fe Opera. Other roles include Auntie in Peter Grimes, Tisbe in La Cenerentola, and Dritte Dame in Die Zauberflöte with Washington National Opera.
Ms. Quintero is a 2006 winner of the Sara Tucker Study Grant from the Richard Tucker Music Foundation; second place winner of the Licia Albanese-Puccini Foundation International Vocal Competition; the George London Foundation; Sullivan Foundation and was a semi-finalist in Plácido Domingo’s Operalia. She sang at the National Endowment for the Arts Opera Honors Inaugural Awards Concert in 2008. She was a 2002 Grand National Finalist in the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions and made her first appearance on the Met stage in the Grand Finals Concert with Julius Rudel.
Media Center
Calendar
Acclaim
Press Kit
Current & Upcoming Performances
Past Performances
7
December
2019
Handel's Messiah
Alto Soloist
Boston Baroque
Boston
NEC's Jordan Hall
6
December
2019
Handel's Messiah
Alto Soloist
Boston Baroque
Boston
NEC's Jordan Hall
17
April
2019
Verdi Requiem
Mezzo-Soprano Soloist
Defiant Requiem
Los Angeles
Royce Hall
16
April
2019
Verdi Requiem
Mezzo-Soprano Soloist
Defiant Requiem
Costa Mesa, CA
Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall
Storge in Jephtha – Boston Baroque
“Mezzo-soprano Ann McMahon Quintero needed no onstage warmup to inhabit Jephtha’s wife, Storge, imparting luminous significance to individual words through subtle vocal swells. The rage air she flung at Jephtha was also a sight and sound to behold, her chest voice ripping through the orchestra.” – Zoë Madonna, Boston Globe
“As Storge, Ann McMahon Quintero’s loamy mezzo-soprano embraced mourning like a down duvet in her first aria sending Jephtha off to war… Her rage and haunted incomprehension of injustice charged through with Azucena amplitude in her third.” – CJ Ru, Boston Musical Intelligencer
The Old Lady in Candide – Arizona Opera
“Quintero was terrific. She was funny and sassy, and her voice was equal parts opera diva and blues singer.” – Cathalena E. Burch, Arizona Daily Star
“Ann McMahon Quintero delivered the goods and was terrific as Cunegonde’s companion with a trail of woes of her own.” – Herbert Paine, Broadway World Opera
“Ann McMahon Quintero sang her Klezmer-infused tango with smoky tones and garnered quite a few laughs with her antics. Her dance to Amy Beth Frankel’s capable choreography was most amusing.” – Maria Nockin, Opera Today
Mistress Quickly in Falstaff – Virginia Opera
“Alice Ford and … Meg Page tended to be seen sitting in a row sipping tea with Ann McMahon Quintero’s Mistress Quickly (who traveled through the show trundling her ubiquitous tea caddy). Their timing was splendid and their conniving delicious.” – Joan Reinthaler, Washington Post
“Though these three roles are not huge, they’re nicely realized by three female vocalists who also possess an excellent sense of comic timing.” – Terry Ponick, Washington Times
Suor Pazienza in Mese Mariano – Spoleto Festival USA
“As the nun (and Carmela’s cherished childhood friend) Suor Pazienza, Ann McMahon Quintero’s rich and dusky mezzo was especially pleasing; so was her compassionate acting.” – Lindsay Koob, Charleston City Paper
“Sister Pazienza [is] Ann McMahon Quintero in handsome voice.” – George Loomis, Musical America
“…Rowley wasn’t the only one who could sing and act well. The entire cast of “Mese Mariano,” from the nuns — especially Mother Superior (Linda Roark-Strummer) and Suor Pazienza (Ann McMahon Quintero) … did their jobs impeccably.” – Adam Parker, The Post and Courier
Amneris in Aida – Annapolis Opera
“Mezzo-soprano Ann McMahon Quintero, as Amneris, delivered a fully nuanced portrayal, alternately sensuously cooing in warm, honeyed tones and soaring regally in her outrage at Radames’ attraction to Aida. In her Act III duet with Radames, Quintero was spellbinding and dramatically compelling as she pleaded with and berated him in her futile attempts to persuade him to love her and live.” – Mary Johnson, Baltimore Sun
Mezzo Soloist in Stravinsky Outside Russia – The American Symphony Orchestra at Carnegie Hall
“The spare, terse structure of the Requiem Canticles builds around fragments of the traditional Requiem text, viewed like shards from antiquity in a coolly focused modern light. In the solo bits, bass-baritone Miller came into his own, he and mezzo Ann McMahon Quintero making their points with somber intensity…To illustrate the variety of what Stravinsky wrote between Zvezdoliki and the Canticles, Botstein next chose Mavra (1922), a brief adventure into comic opera … Mezzos Quintero and Heather Johnson registered gossipy cameos as the girl’s Mother and a Neighbor.” – John W. Freeman, Opera News
Mistress Quickly in Falstaff – Opéra Lausanne
“Regarding the quartet of gossip, we will remember first the Mistress Quickly of Ann McMahon Quintero, with a beautiful color performed with full ease.” – Emmanuel Andrieu, ConcertoNet
Azucena in Il Trovatore – Opéra Royal de Wallonie
“And what to say about the Azucena of the American mezzo, Ann McMahon Quintero? In turn loving and sensitive, fierce and provocative, raw but generous, served by a haunting timbre throughout the tessiture, she will remain the true revelation of a show noted for its effectiveness.” – Serge Martin, Le Soir (Belgium)
“What a beautiful discovery is the American mezzo Ann McMahon Quintero! She rose to the challenge of this role, and God knows Azucena is a moment that matters in a young career. McMahon is a product of the formidable American school. Physically opulent and radiant, with a superbly expressive face, the voice is made of fine material, and carries well…” – Philippe Ponthir, ForumOpera
“Also excellent was mezzo-soprano Ann McMahon Quintero, whose Azucena has the right amount of darkness and never becomes a caricature.” – Nicolas Blanmont, La Libre
“Ann McMahon Quintero gave Azucena vocal and dramatic power.” – Erna Metdepenninghen, Opera Magazine
The Masked Ball
