I applaud all

that Music & Opera Singers Trust Limited (MOST) is achieving to encourage and expand opportunities for the growth of young Australian musicians who have the potential for stellar professional careers.

Dr Di Bresciani
OAM

Founder,
YMF Australia

2012 Winner

2012 Opera Awards recipient

Nicole Car, soprano

Nicole Car is one of Australia’s most outstanding young sopranos.

She completed her Bachelor of Music at the Victorian College of the Arts in 2007. While studying, she was the recipient of many awards including the Alice Amy McDonald Trust, the Sleath Lowrey Rotary Scholarship and the Marion Isobel Thomas Estate Award.

In 2007, Nicole Car won the Herald-Sun Aria; she was also a finalist in the Australia Singing Competition where she was awarded the Symphony Australia Young Vocalist award. She made her major role debut in 2009 performing Donna Anna in Victorian Opera’s Don Giovanni and covered Madama Butterfly for OzOpera.

In 2010, Nicole was a Developing Artist with Victorian Opera. She also sang the soprano solos in Das Klagende Lied for the Queensland Symphony Orchestra under Maestro Johannes Fritzsch and was a featured artist on ABC Classics’ Rule Britannia with the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra. With Maestro Fritzsch and bass-baritone Teddy Tahu-Rhodes, she recorded Brahms’ Deutsches Requiem with the Melbourne Symphony – again, for ABC Classics.

For Opera Australia in 2011, she sang Donna Anna, Mimi in La bohème, Micaela in Carmen and the Italian Singer in Capriccio; for the QSO, she appeared as soloist in the Deutsches Requiem. Her work in Carmen earned Nicole her first Helpmann Award nomination and the following review from Opera Insider:

"...the find of the night. Nicole Car - what a voice! I don't think I can recall such an auspicious debut (at the Sydney Opera House)...since the 1970's...She was truly sensational with one of the most beautifully lyric, full-bodied and honeyed voices I have ever heard."

Her roles for Opera Australia in 2012 included Pamina in a new production of The Magic Flute, Leila in The Pearl Fishers and Valencienne in The Merry Widow. She was also engaged by the Tasmanian Symphony for their performances of the Deutsches Requiem.

In 2013, Nicole Car sings Mimi for Opera Australia and is soloist with the Melbourne Symphony and Auckland Philharmonia; future appearances in leading roles are scheduled for Perth, Sydney, Melbourne and the United States.

Nicole Car Biography (pdf)