What people are saying.
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"Soprano Nadine Benjamin scintillated with her performance... With rich and piercing notes echoing around the beautiful historic Grand Theatre, it was easy to forget there was another singer due on stage."
— Alison Brinkworth, Birmingham Live
Welsh National Opera at Wolverhampton,
Music From The Heart tour 2023
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"[Benjamin's] overwhelming delivery began with the scintillating masterpiece 'Supre Libera' (La Traviata)... In this role..., Nadine showed her sometimes sultry side, yet always full of warmth... She maintains a controlled brilliance at the top levels and hit those... 'money notes, the climactic point of arias, including high 'C's' for sopranos!"
— Clive Peacock (Leamington Spa Courier), 16 June 2023
Warwickshire Symphony Orchestra conducted by Roger Coull, Verdi Arias, All Saints, Leamington, 10 June 2023
(To read the whole review, please scroll down to the next section, to the clipping image.)
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"The late Jessye Norman is a soprano who in the public mind took possession of these deeply nostalgic Four Last Songs... Benjamin seems a possible post-Norman contender, with not just a voice unstrained when reaching highest, but distinct and personal interpretation and live performance stagecraft."
— Review, Richard Amey; Article, Phil Hewett (Sussex Express)
Nadine sings Four Last Songs (Richard Strauss) in Worthing Philharmonic Orchestra ‘Summer Concert’ at Assembly Hall, Sunday 11 June 2023 (3pm), conducted by Dominic Grier. (Day 2, first Worthing Festival, June 10-18)
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"More thoughtfully involved, [Benjamin] disregards the automatic traditional custom... that song artists simply stand and sing... Instead, Benjamin introduces some telling humanising enactment and projection... Personifying the soul’s liberation during slumber, ‘Going to Sleep’ features one of the world’s great orchestral violin solos. Benjamin makes it speak back to the singer... In sublime reciprocation, physically she turns to face her violinist as he plays, to listen, concur, commune and empathise with his message of release. At its conclusion, still facing him, now singing back, she begins her vocal entry and only slowly resumes her outlook over the audience."
— Review, Richard Amey; Article, Phil Hewett (Sussex Express)
Nadine sings Four Last Songs (Richard Strauss) in Worthing Philharmonic Orchestra ‘Summer Concert’ at Assembly Hall, Sunday 11 June 2023 (3pm), conducted by Dominic Grier. (Day 2, first Worthing Festival, June 10-18)
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"Such artistry was not lost on the orchestra. WPO secretary and second violins member, Michelle Willis: 'Some of us were moved to tears when she turned to watch Preston play.'"
— Review, Richard Amey; Article, Phil Hewett (Sussex Express)
Nadine sings Four Last Songs (Richard Strauss) in Worthing Philharmonic Orchestra ‘Summer Concert’ at Assembly Hall, Sunday 11 June 2023 (3pm), conducted by Dominic Grier. (Day 2, first Worthing Festival, June 10-18)
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"The performers are all outstanding. British soprano and former ENO Harewood Artist Nadine Benjamin is The Mother, a role she fully inhabits. Her voice is terrific: powerful and passionate with a beautiful vocal tone."
— Rebecca Armstrong (Opera for All)
Watch: Blue (Tesori / Thompson) UK Première, English National Opera (ENO) trailer
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"The cast is headed by the astonishing Nadine Benjamin... It is Benjamin who really provided the lifeblood of the performance, living each line assigned to her, the heartbreak so poignant in the second act... Benjamin’s voice has it all: range (lovely lower register, really strong, power up top), expressivity and nuance."
— Colin Clarke (Seen and Heard International )
Blue, English National Opera
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"South London-born soprano Nadine Benjamin is particularly outstanding among the singers... [H]er final cry of anguish is terrifying, but there is also tenderness and steely determination."
— Nick Kimberley (Evening Standard)
Blue, English National Opera
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"Nadine Benjamin as The Mother delivered the kind of performance one has come to expect from this exceptional young singer – poised, emotional and thrillingly voiced."
— Keith McDonnell (Music OMH)
Blue, English National Opera
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"Ceiling fans spin as Nadine Benjamin’s Clara sings 'Summertime' to her baby – it’s the first singing we hear, and Benjamin delivers it gorgeously."
— Erica Jeal (The Guardian)
Porgy & Bess (Gershwin and Gershwin), ENO
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“Individually, I would pick out … Nadine Benjamin’s Clara (her ‘Summertime’ is one of the loveliest I’ve heard) ….”
The Times
Porgy & Bess (Gershwin and Gershwin), ENO
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"All the female singers are excellently Mozartian.... Nadine Benjamin's sumptuously sung Act III aria is also deluxe casting."
— Hugh Canning (The Sunday Times)
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“Benjamin sang exquisitely; her voice has the texture and balance for later Verdi and she uses it with style and expertise.”
Opera Magazine
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“Nadine Benjamin’s scene-stealing Musetta suggested a warmth and humanity that would serve her well as a future Mimì.”
— Hugh Canning (The Sunday Times)
Puccini’s La bohème, English National Opera
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"…[T]his was a star turn, wonderfully animated, alluringly garish and crowned by Benjamin's gleaming soprano and seductive phrasing. Please can we have her back?"
Opera Magazine
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"Benjamin was tremendous: pouring out her long, curving lines with a fervour that glowed when quiet and burned with a controlled brilliance at the tops of phrases, crowning ensembles and choral numbers with a tingling halo of sound."
— Richard Bratby (The Spectator)
Verdi’s Luisa Miller, Glyndebourne
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"Benjamin’s voice itself is to die for. Her soprano has a burnished, velvety tone that works perfectly; she has a developed lower register that finds her easily essaying the registral extremes of Mimì’s part. The sense of real attraction and rapport between Benjamin’s Mimì and Kim’s Rodolfo allowed the final scenes of the opera to tear us apart emotionally (as indeed they should). It is an almost complete assumption of Mimì, and the cheers at her curtain call were fully deserved."
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"All was beautifully sung by sopranos Nadine Benjamin and Anna Dennis and the mezzo-soprano Susan Bickley, who also featured in Grant Gee’s accompanying video: overlaid, slow-motion images of lockdown life. Some will have found this a telling encapsulation of pandemic reality. Others, myself included, longed to be carried to a different horizon."
— Fiona Maddocks (The Guardian)
Vespers for a New Dark Age (2014) by American composer Missy Mazzoli (director Katie Mitchell; conductor Natalie Murray Beale). Choral piece by Icelandic composer Anna Thorvaldsdottir; songs including the lovely Heal You, by British composer Anna Meredith.
'Opera star hits the high notes in overwhelming fashion', Entertainment Section, Leamington Spa Courier - review by Clive Peacock.
Appearances
13 June 2023 - Nadine Benjamin appeared to co-present with Petroc Trelawny on BBC’s Cardiff Singer of the World, bringing “her magnetic presence”.
Interviews and other press
Claudia Pritchard gives us a lovely insight into Nadine Benjamin’s career, from her origins to 2021, in Culture Whisperer.