Maren Montalbano

Mezzo-soprano Maren Montalbano has been hailed as “pure, suave and sensuous” (Philadelphia Inquirer) and “impeccable” (Broad Street Review). A graduate of both New England Conservatory of Music and Tufts University, Ms. Montalbano can be heard on five GRAMMY Award-winning albums: Ochre (2024), Born (2023), Lansing McLoskey’s Zealot Canticles (2019), Gavin Bryars’ The Fifth Century (2018), John Adams’ Pulitzer Prize-winning work, On the Transmigration of Souls (2005).

Her debut album, Sea Tangle: Songs from the North, featuring all women composers and performers, was released in December 2016. When the pandemic hit in 2020, she wrote, produced, and starred in an interactive digital one-woman show called The Bodice Ripper Project, which had its world premiere at the Philadelphia Fringe Festival, and she started a podcast of the same name. In the 2026-27 season, Ms. Montalbano will be performing in Written in the Stars, Lyric Fest’s season opener, as well as Opera Philadelphia’s revival of Gershwin’s Let ‘Em Eat Cake. She is currently developing a new album that incorporates some of her own compositions as well as commissioning emerging composers.