Praised as “radiant” by the Boston Globe, Angela Yam is renowned for her impeccable musicianship and fierce stage presence. Her Boston Lyric Opera debut as Ismene in Mozart’s Mitridate was hailed “a sweetly poisonous, scene-stealing schemer with a sultry sparkle in her voice,” and awarded the 2024 Best Breakout Performance in a Supporting Role by the Boston Globe. Her debut with Boston Baroque as Diana in Gluck’s Iphigénie en Tauride was similarly praised for her “gleaming clarity” and “fitting rococo brilliance.”
Angela’s 2024-25 season included her Boston Lyric Opera debut as Ismene in Mozart’s Mitridate, Rebecca in Heartbeat Opera’s SLAYLEM: The Witch Trials, Liesgen in Bach’s Coffee Cantata (Boston Baroque, North Star Baroque), Horse and Rabbit in Meilina Tsui & Melisa Tien’s The Big Swim (Asia Society Texas with Houston Grand Opera), the world premiere of The Pigeon Keeper by David Hanlon & Stephanie Fleischmann as Orsia (Opera Parallèle), Heavenly Friend 1 and Carrie Pipperidge cover in Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Carousel (Boston Lyric Opera), and a return to the title role of Cavalli’s La Calisto (Opera Memphis).
Past projects include Josephine Young understudy in Huang Ruo & David Henry Hwang’s An American Soldier (PAC NYC), the title role of Cavalli’s La Calisto (Opera Memphis), Johanna in Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd (Chautauqua Opera, Opera Saratoga), Diana in Gluck’s Iphigénie en Tauride (Boston Baroque), and Cobweb in Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Santa Fe Opera).
World premieres include an “adorable and vocally excellent” Mumei in Kenji Oh’s The Emissary with Opera Parallèle (San Francisco Classical Voice), Siren 1 in Ellis Ludwig-Leone & Karen Russel’s The Night Falls (BalletCollective), Agave (cover) in John Corigliano’s The Lord of Cries (Santa Fe Opera) and the Bird in Jones & Tinley’s ICELAND (Overtone Industries), a role for which she was described as “stellar…a Puccini-esque soprano with incredible highs” (Poison Put to Sound).
Yam’s solo concert appearances include the New York City Ballet (Mendelssohn: A Midsummer Night’s Dream), Opera Saratoga (Rossini: Petite messe solennelle), and Music at Co-Cath (Monteverdi: Vespro della Beata Vergine). As an ensemble singer, Yam has sung with the New York Philharmonic Chorus, Ekmeles Vocal Ensemble, and Nightingale Vocal Ensemble.
Yam was a New York City District Winner in the 2023 Metropolitan Opera Laffont Competition, and her self-directed Visual Recital was awarded 3rd place in the 2022 American Prize Competition. She composed for and directed Nightingale Vocal Ensemble’s award-winning 2023 choral opera ADRIFT. She has been an Apprentice Artist at Boston Lyric Opera, Santa Fe Opera, Chautauqua Opera, Fargo-Moorhead Opera, and Opera Saratoga, and received a Graduate Diploma from New England Conservatory.
As a performer and composer, I am inspired by the ways that each art form requires both attention to the history and traditions of a given medium, as well as individual artistic expression in putting a piece together. As a performer, I interpret the music and intention that a composer has scribed into a score; as a composer, I trust the performer(s) to expand upon the intention of a prescribed score. This collaborative process provides a ripe, fertile ground for artistic connection across mediums and between individual artists, in a process that I find builds collaborative connective tissue, fosters artistic community, and expands my understanding of humanity. Because of this, I am most drawn to themes of connection (family, feminist and LGBTQIA+ stories, liberation through self-expression, etc.) and the ways in which that connection is disrupted (generational and cultural differences, climate change, death, loss, etc.). As a composer, I take care in choosing my themes and collaborations to find projects that speak to me as an individual, in which I can expand a narrative of progress and individual/societal healing.
September 19-21, 2025 | Boston Center of the Arts, Boston, MA
Angela Yam returns to Guerilla Opera for the world premiere of Elisabet Curbelo’s Ululations and Gurgles of the Invisible, performing the role of the Queen of Crickets.
“Fusing music, dance, and ASL, Deaf and hearing artists perform through expressive signing and with live instrumentation. Motion-sensor technology translates movement into both sound and imagery, immersing audiences in themes of communication and transcendence. Inspired by García Lorca’s poetry, the cast includes Angela Yam, Yoko Hagino, Mike Williams, and dancers from Urban Jazz Dance Company. Captioned in English and ADA accessible.”
September 25, 2025 | Boston Public Library, Boston, MA
Angela Yam sings a recital and speaks on a panel with Chelsea Basler and Ji Yung Lee for Boston Lyric’s event, Opera for Opera Night at the BPL: “Women and Ambition.”
“Female characters grappling with power have a distinct presence across centuries of operatic composition. Are we listening to what they have to say? Tonight, we will explore the nuances of this emotionally, psychologically, and politically complex repertoire, brought to life with thrilling performances by BLO musicians. We hope you will join the conversation during the audience Q&A.”
September 27, 2025 | Unbound Visual Arts, Boston, MA
Angela Yam performs with DREAMGLOW in an extension of their Slumber Party tour, featuring dancer Ali Wong.
“Performances by musicians DREAMGLOW, Isabella Febbroriello, and Amber Dai. Expect to hear a set full of lush vocal harmonies, a performance guided by capitalist critique, and an offering carved with breath and sound.”
October 10-12, 2025 | Emerson Colonial Theatre, Boston, MA
Angela Yam returns to Boston Lyric Opera as Apparition 2 in Verdi’s Macbeth.
“Shakespeare’s iconic tragedy becomes a psychological battleground examining the catastrophic consequences of war. Seduced by ambition, a power-hungry couple claw their way to the throne—only to find their aspirations twisted into madness. Giuseppe Verdi’s career-defining music underscores their ruthless ascent. This is opera at its most thrilling: a blazing struggle with fate’s cruel grip.”
October 24-26, 2025 | CounterPulse, San Francisco, CA
Angela Yam returns to Guerilla Opera for the West Coast premiere of Elisabet Curbelo’s Ululations and Gurgles of the Invisible, performing the role of the Queen of Crickets.
“Fusing music, dance, and ASL, Deaf and hearing artists perform through expressive signing and with live instrumentation. Motion-sensor technology translates movement into both sound and imagery, immersing audiences in themes of communication and transcendence. Inspired by García Lorca’s poetry, the cast includes Angela Yam, Yoko Hagino, Mike Williams, and dancers from Urban Jazz Dance Company. Captioned in English and ADA accessible.”
October 30-November 8, 2025 | Judson Memorial Church, New York, NY
Angela Yam returns to Heartbeat Opera for their 10th annual drag extravaganza Orgy and Bess: Deep Throats & High Notes, performing the role of Cio-Cio-San.
“Heartbeat Opera presents our 10th Annual Drag Extravaganza, a hilarious, irreverent party at the bold intersection of drag and opera! ORGY & BESS takes off from Porgy and Bess, but goes on to skewer the entire opera canon. What happens to Bess after Porgy? She stumbles from the 1920s into 2025 NYC, and the first person she meets is Cio-Cio-San from Madama Butterfly. Then it's Lucia from Lucia di Lammermoor. As more characters travel through the magical glory hole, the orgy heats up, and Bess learns about the trap of being a trope. Together with her new sisterhood, she takes a journey to radical self-love through a whirlwind of arias and numbers from Madama Butterfly, Turandot, Norma, Lucia, Carmina Burana, Lohengrin, The Mikado, The Wiz, Rent, and more!”
November 30, 2025 | Rooted Armory Cafe, Boston, MA
Angela Yam performs with her band DREAMGLOW, performing a mix of their own repertoire as well as 4 re-imagined premieres by local composers.
“Orkest is BACK at the Rooted Armory Cafe featuring the Lo-Fi Band DREAMGLOW and the winners of our call for scores. Let’s get comfy.”
December 2-8, 2025 | Berkeley, CA
Angela Yam joins West Edge Opera for the workshop of Alyssa Weinberg and Stephanie Fleischmann’s Claude & Marcel, performing the role of Charlotte.
“The opera tells the story of Claude Cahun and Marcel Moore: two women – romantic and artistic partners - Jewish activists and surrealist photographers who used their art to magnify resistance against Nazi Germany. Claude & Marcel is the third complete length opera to be commissioned and developed by West Edge Opera. Claude & Marcel was commissioned in 2023 and will premiere in August 2027.”
February 20-22, 2026 | Asia Society Texas Center & Houston Grand Opera, Houston, TX
Angela Yam returns as Rabbit and Horse in a Lunar New Year children's opera, The Big Swim by composer Meilina Tsui and librettist Melisa Tien.
“The Big Swim, a chamber opera celebrating the Lunar New Year, returns for 3 performances at Asia Society Texas on February 20–22. The one-act children's opera is a contemporary retelling of a Chinese fable that explains how the order of the 12 animals in the zodiac calendar was determined by a race across a river held by the Jade Emperor. In this telling by composer Meilina Tsui and librettist Melisa Tien, the audience is the Emperor and the race does not go exactly how the animals expect it to.”
April 24-May 3, 2026 | Emerson Colonial Theatre, Boston, MA
Angela Yam returns to Boston Lyric Opera for a new English adaptation of Donizetti’s The Daughter of the Regiment, performing the role of Hortensia and covering Marie.
“Laughter meets revolutionary spirit in BLO’s staging of Donizetti’s glorious comedy. Inspired by the life of Deborah Sampson, the Massachusetts revolutionary who disguised herself as a man to fight for independence, this production transports us to Revolutionary-era Boston, telling a heartfelt tale of love and loyalty to celebrate America’s 250th anniversary. With a new English dialogue by Kirsten Greenidge, it’s a patriotic toast to America at 250—and to the rebels who shaped it.”
September 28, 2025 | M.I.T.’s Killian Hall, Boston, MA
Angela Yam debuts her first art song cycle Gaia Builds the World, with lyrics by Clare Fuyuko Bierman, performed by soprano Dana Lynn Varga and pianist Brendon Shapiro.
“Join us for an exciting afternoon of world premiere performances - the culmination of months of creative collaboration! FUSE: Collaborations in Song is a uniquely collaborative song-development program for singers, composers, and poets that results in the creation of amazing new songs that are tailor-made for the singers who will give their world-premiere performance!”
January 30-February 2, 2026 | TBA, Boston, MA
Angela Yam debuts her first opera Threesome, a collaboration with librettist Susan Bywaters, as part of Boston Opera Collaborative’s Opera Bites.
“Opera Bites is Boston Opera Collaborative’s two-year-long micro opera commissioning program and post-educational residency, culminating in a final performance of compelling 10-minute "bite-sized" operas.”
December 21, 2024 | Cathedral Church of St. Paul, Boston, MA
Angela Yam’s original choral composition emPire premieres at Nightingale Vocal Ensemble’s Solstice concert.
“Nightingale Vocal Ensemble presents an immersive concert that blends old-world traditions, folklore, and the timeless magic of solstice rituals. Many solstice celebrations centered on sacred fires, calling the sun back to the earth—renewal, protection, and the promise of Spring. This concert explores night’s place in our lives: a time for sharing stories, singing songs, confronting fears, and encountering both the divine and the terrible. Expect diverse music—beautiful, folk, strange, and lovely—movement through the space, and a communal sing-along around the fire. Come keep warm around the fire with us on the longest night of the year. This project is produced by Nicholas Ford.”
January 18, 2025 | Boston Center for the Arts Cyclorama, Boston, MA
Angela Yam leads Sound Artists in fully improvised sound-making for Olivia Moon’s ACTivate Residency at the BCA Cyclorama.
“For her ACTivate residency, Olivia, along with the expertise and assistance of Jaina Cipriano, plans to decorate the Cyclorama with portable poles, pole dancers, projection, and other sculptural components. Throughout the week, the dancers will pull from experimental practices of contemporary dance to create improvisational structures within pole dance. The residency will culminate in an informal showing of this interdisciplinary pole dance investigation.”
January 29 - April 20, 2025 | SMFA at Tufts, Boston, MA
Angela Yam and Nathan Halbur’s 10 musical miniatures play as part of Kledia Spiro’s exhibition “Press and Sniff” in an archive and/or a repertoire at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University.
“an archive and/or a repertoire explores the liminal spaces that emerge between archives and ephemeral new media. Featuring the Mobius, Inc. Records —the administrative archive of the Boston-based Mobius Artists Group—this exhibition serves as a local laboratory, delving into materials from Mobius’ experimental performances, new media projects, sound works, dances, and installations.”
March 14-16, 2025 | Z Space, San Francisco, CA
Angela Yam and collaborators Yayoi Kambara, Loni Landon, and Janesta Edmonds create a world premiere dance piece, The Curse of Jezebel and Ascension, for Robert Moses’ Kin’s "New Legacies: One Acts" series. Angela Yam composes and records the music for this piece.
“RMK presents three original works choreographed by three guest artists. Each piece features a collaboration with both a composer and a writer, resulting in dynamic and multi-disciplined works. These triptychs are presented as part of RMK's ‘New Legacies: One Acts’ series, a platform for emerging and established voices in contemporary dance.”
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