Australian soprano, co-founder and Artistic Director of Victory Hall Opera in Charlottesville, VA, Miriam Gordon-Stewart has gained recognition across four continents for her powerful instrument and dramatic vulnerability, specializing in the repertoire of Wagner and Strauss. As a director, her award-winning productions have drawn audiences from across America to Charlottesville, VA where she has gained recognition as "pushing the envelope and staking new ground" (Washington Post, Anne Midgette). She originated the Motif staging methodology, now central to VHO productions.
2024 sees Miriam beginning work on two major projects: She will direct YAPs (a documentary film focussing on the competitive and controversial world of Young Artist Programs) and will create the libretto for the World Premiere of Mall in America.
In 2023, Gordon-Stewart broke new ground with the creation of Orpheus & Erica , a Deaf Opera. Miriam wrote new text for Gluck's Orfeo ed Euridice, performed in ASL by some of America's foremost Deaf actors alongside opera singers from The Met, La Scala et al. She co-directed the opera with Alek Lev. This new genre drew audiences from across the US to the World Premiere season at Old Cabell Hall in the University of Virginia, and was released on film.
Described in the French press as “a genuine singer-actress”, she has performed over 50 leading roles at major opera houses including the Sydney Opera House, Hamburg State Opera, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Hannover, Mannheim, Kassel, Châtelet (Paris), Korean National Opera and the Bayreuth Festival. She has also performed in concert with the Dresden Philharmonic, the Gulbenkian Orchestra, Lisbon and the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, among many others.
At Victory Hall Opera, Miriam also made roles debuts as The Marschallin in Der Rosenkavalier and Isolde in Tristan und Isolde. Additionally, Gordon-Stewart directed new productions of Hansel and Gretel, The Medium, Haydn's Armida and Rameau's Achante et Céphise.
She was a resident soloist with Hamburg Staatsoper from 2005-2009, performing roles including Countess (Nozze di Figaro), Donna Elvira (Don Giovanni), Jenufa, Mimi, Madame Lidoine (Dialogues des Carmelites), Freia (Rheingold) and Arabella amongst many others. Other career highlights have included Eva (Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg) with Opera Australia, Mannheim and Kassel, Marie in Wozzeck with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, Sieglinde for Opera Australia’s Ring Cycle in 2013, (for which she received a Helpmann Award Nomination) and Helmwige at the Bayreuth Festival under Christian Thielemann.
Miriam began her career as a soloist at Opera Australia, performing roles including Mimi, Leila (The Pearlfishers), Countess (Marriage of Figaro), Hanna Glawari (The Merry Widow), Eva (Meistersinger) and Miss Jessel (Turn of the Screw).
In 2020, Miriam wrote the libretto for Fat Pig, a new opera by Matt Boehler, based on Neil LaBute's play. She directed UNSUNG, a full-length documentary film for Victory Hall Opera, (a finalist in the SF3 Film Festival in Sydney) and made her debut as Brünnhilde in Wagner's Ring Cycle in Toronto and Belleville in a co-production between Opera By Request and Berlin Wagner Gruppe.
Gordon-Stewart returns regularly to Australia where she recently performed in a Strauss Gala with Simone Young and the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, Korngold and Jankowski concert programs at Coriole Music Festival and Mahler 8 in Brisbane.
In 2022 Gordon-Stewart directed both the stage and film World Premiere of Fat Pig. She also released her second documentary film, Top Job, an examination of the reasons for gender inequality in Australian opera leadership.