Roberta Alexander


Roberta Alexander is an American operatic soprano. She began her career as a leading soprano in 1975 and spent the next three decades performing principal roles with opera houses internationally. More recently she has performed secondary character roles on stage, including performances at the in 2013, La Scala in 2014, and La Monnaie in 2015. She performed the 5th maid in Strauss's Elektra at the Metropolitan Opera in 2016 and Curra in Verdi's La forza del destino at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, in 2019.

Life and career

Born in Lynchburg, Virginia, Alexander's mother was a singer, and her father was a choral conductor. She grew up in Yellow Springs, Ohio, after her family moved there when she was age 2. She studied music at Central State University, the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, and the Royal Conservatory of The Hague.
Alexander moved to the Netherlands at age 23. She made her debut at the Netherlands Opera in 1975 in La cambiale di matrimonio. Later that year she created the role of Bubikopf in the world premiere of Viktor Ullmann's Der Kaiser von Atlantis.
In 1980 Alexander made her American debut as Pamina in The Magic Flute with the Houston Grand Opera. She was an apprentice singer with Santa Fe Opera, and made her feature role debut with Santa Fe Opera under conductor John Crosby in the title role of Strauss' Daphne in 1981. Her Metropolitan Opera debut was in 1983 as Zerlina in Don Giovanni. In 1984 she made her debut at The Royal Opera, London, as Mimì in La bohème. In 1989 she gave a lauded portrayal of the title role in Jenůfa at the Glyndebourne Festival. She has recorded for the Dutch label Etcetera Records, in addition to selected recordings for such labels as Philips.
Orchestras she has performed with include the Vienna, London and Royal Philharmonics; Royal Concertgebouw, Philadelphia, Cleveland and Bavarian Radio Orchestras; and the Cincinnati, Atlanta, Boston, and Dallas Symphony Orchestras. Conductors she has worked with include Vladimir Ashkenazy, Andrew Litton, Bernard Haitink, Sir Colin Davis, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, James Levine, Zubin Mehta, Carlo Maria Giulini, Leonard Slatkin, Jesus Lopez-Cobos, Seiji Ozawa, André Previn, Sir Simon Rattle, and David Zinman.
Alexander has been married twice. Her first marriage was to Edo de Waart in the early 1970s, and ended in divorce. She married her second husband, orchestral manager Siebe Riedstra, in 1975.

Selected discography