Daire Halpin is an Irish soprano of considerable talent.
Born and bred in Dublin, Daire comes from a musical family with many family members enjoying careers in the arts as teachers, performers, and designers.
Daire is a graduate of the Guildhall School of Music and Drama Opera Course (MMus and PGDip – Distinction), DIT Conservatory of Music and Drama, Dublin, (MMus and BMus – distinction) and Trinity College Dublin (BAMod – Music and Philosophy). She also spent a year studying voice at il Conservatorio Statale di Musica “Luigi Cherubini” in Florence, Italy and was one of only five international singers selected to study at the International Lied Masterclasses, Koninklijk Conservatorium, Brussels 2008-9.
She won numerous awards to support her studies from from the Arts Council (Ireland), the Arts Humanities Research Council, the Worshipful Company of Barbers, the Anthony Kearns Music Fund and Fenn Wright Manson. At the DIT Conservatory of Music and Drama, she was also awarded the Michael Mc Namara medal for highest marks for performance in the graduating class and the special excellence award for outstanding achievement in performance and academic studies.
Daire is in great demand as a soloist and her career has taken her to Sweden, Belgium, France, Spain, Germany, Italy, Japan and the US as well as Ireland and the UK.
Daire has sung principle roles with Irish National Opera, Theater Magdeburg, NI Opera, Opera Theatre Company, Nevill Holt Opera, Wide Open Opera, Scottish Opera, the European Opera Centre and English National Opera, among others. Roles Include: Maid (Powder Her Face), Elizabeth I, Lucia, Sophia (Heresy), Zerlina (Don Giovanni), Apollo (Il Parnasso Confuso), Lucy Lockitt (Beggar’s Opera), Proserpina (Orfeo – Monteverdi), Adina (Elisir D’Amore), Susanna (Le Nozze di Figaro), Despina (Cosi fan Tutte), Theodora (Theodora), Pamina/Papagena (Die Zauberflöte), Sylvie (La Colombe), Gabrielle (La Vie Parisienne), Diana (Orpheus and the Underworld), Belinda (Dido and Aeneas) and Amor (Orfeo – Gluck).
Daire is a regular oratorio soloist and has sung with the RTÉ Concert and Symphony Orchestras, Our Lady’s Choral Society, Tallaght Choral Society, Trinity Choral Society, Dún Laoghaire Choral Society, Eastbourne Choral Society, East Sussex Bach Choir, the Baroque Collective, Schola Cantorum Oxford and Goldsmiths Choral Union among others.
Daire is also a keen recitalist and has given many recitals at home and abroad, notably at St Martin-in-the-Fields, for Friends of Britten, at the National Portrait Gallery in London, the National Concert Hall, Dublin, the Irish Embassy, London, and at the home of the President of Ireland; Áras an Uachtaráin.
In 2007, Daire gave a recital tour of Japan with the New Crawford Piano Trio to celebrate 50 years of Irish diplomatic relations with Japan and in 2013, she appeared as a soloist on tour with the European Youth Orchestra.
Daire is also a keen advocate of contemporary music and has worked with numerous composers including Colin Mawby, Jacob de Haan, Raymond Deane, Roger Doyle, David Wallace and Craig Armstrong to deliver premieres of their works. In 2015, the National Concert Hall, Dublin, commissioned Nico Muhly to write a new work for Daire and Thomas Bartlett; ‘Byzantium’ for Yeats 2015.
Daire Halpin - Soprano 