British soprano Emma Bell made her Royal Opera debut in 2005 as Leonora (Maskarade) and has since returned to sing Donna Elvira (Don Giovanni), Tina (Weir’s Miss Fortune), Eva (Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg), Madame Lidoine (Dialogues des Carmélites) and Elisabeth (Tannhäuser) for the Company.

Bell was born in Leamington Spa and trained at the Royal Academy of Music with Joy Mammen, with whom she continues to learn. She won the Kathleen Ferrier Award in 1998 and in 2002 took up a three-year contract at the Komische Oper Berlin, where her roles included Alcina, Countess Almaviva (Le nozze di Figaro), Agathe (Der Freischütz) and Mimì (La bohème). Appearances since include Vitellia (La clemenza di Tito) and Leonore (Fidelio) for English National Opera, Leonore for Opera North, Elettra (Idomeneo) and Donna Elvira for La Scala, Milan, Countess Almaviva and Donna Elvira for the Metropolitan Opera, New York, Countess Almaviva for Paris Opéra, Fox (The Cunning Little Vixen) for Glyndebourne Festival, Governess (The Turn of the Screw) for Teatro Real, Madrid, and Berlin State Opera, Elsa (Lohengrin) for Welsh National Opera and Hamburg State Opera and Arabella for Oper Köln. 

A prolific concert artist, Bell has sung widely in the UK and with orchestras including London Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestra Nazionale of the Accademia di Santa Cecilia, Netherlands Radio Orchestra, the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse and the Rotterdam Philharmonic, in repertory ranging from Mozart’s Requiem to Britten’s War Requiem. She appears regularly at the BBC Proms.