Héloïse’s debut album ‘Phrases’ is out now on Delphian Records and Gramophone Magazine Editor’s Choice (“extraordinary range, tone and vocal abilities (…) composer of subtle imagination”), Presto Classical Editor’s Choice (“absolute tour de force”), BBC Music Magazine Choral/Song Choice (*****), Classical album of the week in The Times (****) and described by Apple Music as “a staggering debut from an imaginative and original voice”.

Recipient of the Michael Cuddigan Trust Award 2018 and Linda Hirst Contemporary Vocal Prize 2017, French-born and London-based soprano and composer Héloïse Werner was one of the four shortlisted nominees in the Young Artist category of the Royal Philharmonic Society Music Awards 2017 and one of BBC Radio 3’s 31 under 31 Young Stars 2020.  From the 2023/24 season, she joins London’s Wigmore Hall as an Associate Artist. She will hold the position for five seasons and appear at the hall at least once a year during the period. She begins this journey on 2 March 2024 in a concert with mezzo-soprano Helen Charlston, harpist Anne Denholm and pianist Mishka Rushdie Momen.

As a soprano, Héloïse has recently made her debut with the London Chamber Orchestra, BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, CBSO, Nash Ensemble, and at The Grange Festival. She will be singing the role of Madame DuVal in the upcoming production Sarah Angliss’ new opera Giant at the Aldeburgh Festival 2023.

As a composer, Héloïse has written for the CBSO, Aurora Orchestra, Clare Choir Cambridge, Maîtrise de Radio France, London Handel Festival, violist Lawrence Power, bassoonist Amy Harman, violinist Hae-Sun Kang (Festival Présences), pianist Mishka Rushdie Momen (Lucerne Festival), CoMA (CoMA Festival), The Gesualdo Six, The Bach Choir, mezzo-soprano Marielou Jacquard, pianist Kunal Lahiry and mezzo-soprano Helen Charlston, amongst others. A selected list of her works is available here.

In 2019, Héloïse performed her solo opera The Other Side of the Sea at Kings Place as part of their Venus Unwrapped series  (“you can’t help but be dazzled by it” **** The Times).  Written in collaboration with poet Octavia Bright, director Emily Burns and visual artist Jessie Rodger, the opera explores language and identity. It was first premiered in London & Aldeburgh in 2018, with generous support from The Michael Cuddigan Trust, and developed in 2017 during a Snape Maltings residency under the mentorship of Zoë Martlew. In 2016, Héloïse starred in Jonathan Woolgar’s acclaimed one-woman opera Scenes from the End at London’s Tristan Bates Theatre, following on from successful runs at the Camden and Edinburgh Fringe Festivals.

Héloïse was born in Paris and was a member of the ‘Maîtrise de Radio France’ for six years. At the same time, she studied the cello at the Conservatoire Maurice Ravel with Valérie Aimard. She then read music at Clare College, Cambridge, where she was a choral scholar. At Cambridge, she studied composition with Giles Swayne and won the 2011 Clare College Carol Competition. In 2009, she was awarded the ‘Creation Prize’ from the Conservatoire Maurice Ravel for her songs for piano and voice, which she performed as part of her cello final diploma. She completed her vocal studies with Alison Wells and coach Anna Tilbrook on the MMus course at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance as a Linda Pilgrim Charitable Trust Scholar and a Help Musicians UK Postgraduate Award holder.

Web: heloisewerner.com / Twitter: @Heloise_Werner