Lara Bolton is a pianist, vocal coach, conductor, and arranger. Her work spans many different genres, including classical, rock, jazz, and musical theater. In addition to maintaining an active concert and recording career, she serves on the faculty at the University of Minnesota as a vocal coach, She has created an innovative opera/soul/jazz synthesis project called Voxspex, which has been produced in Minneapolis and New York and will be remounted in 2022. She is also a regular collaborator on the fusion concept project Guns N’ Rosenkavalier. Ms. Bolton has a long career in traditional operatic vocal coaching and repertoire. In this capacity, she has been engaged at San Francisco Opera, Washington National Opera, San Diego Opera, Seattle Opera, Washington Concert Opera, Chicago Opera Theater, Quad Cities Symphony, Minnesota Opera,
Opera Santa Barbara, Out of the Box Opera, West Bay Opera, Opera Colorado, and Amarillo Opera. She has led musical preparation for projects at the Guthrie and Jungle theaters, and Theater Latté Da. She was Head of Music for Mill City Summer Opera and will conduct An Opera Theatre’s upcoming production of Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia.
Ms. Bolton is a former San Francisco Opera Adler Fellow and has been a Domingo-Cafritz Young Artist for the Washington National Opera. She also helped develop a Young Artist Program for Opera Santa Barbara. In addition to having been a pianist for the Merola Opera Program, she has also worked at the Music Academy of the West, Brevard Music Festival, and Interlochen Arts Camp. As an alumna of Interlochen Arts Academy, she received a Bachelor of Music Theory degree from the University of Michigan and a Master of Music in Collaborative Piano from the University of Maryland-College Park.