Education - Studies
AMus (Voice), Western Ontario Conservatory of Music BA (Music), The University of Western Ontario Certificate of Advanced Studies (Singing Performance), Guildhall School of Music and Drama, London, UK One year Master Course (Voice), National Opera Studio, London, UK
Teaching
Private Studio
The University of Western Ontario, London, ON
Professional Activities
In her private voice studio Susan Ambrose places the emphasis on breathing, singing techniques, and languages. She has experience teaching boy sopranos; developing voices through the teen years; university level voices, both undergraduate and post-graduate; professional voices; and mature voices.
Susan studied intensively in Europe for fourteen years with Walther Grüner, Otakar Kraus, Madame Vera Rosza, and Hans Hotter. She had intensive vocal coaching with many top international coaches, privately and with international opera houses, including Robin Bowman, London, England (French repertoire), Martin Isepp, London (opera), Walter Taussig, New York (German repertoire), David Triestram, New York (general operatic roles), and Prunella Scales, London (speech and drama). She sang in master classes with internationally renowned artists, including Sir Georg Solti, Graziella Schiulti, Hans Hotter, and Gérard Souzay.
Susan Ambrose won a number of international awards and scholarships, and has worked with such international conductors as Sir Georg Solti, Sir Colin Davis, Sir Bernard Haitink, and Sir Charles Mackerras. Ms. Ambrose has made a number of presentations to the Voice College of Examiners concerning the marking of technical requirements, ear tests, and sight singing. She also presented an additional workshop on the marking of musical theatre. In 2009 Ms. Ambrose conducted a workshop at the annual national conference of the Canadian Federation of Music Teachers’ Association at Mount Allison University. The workshop included an introduction to the 2012 RCM Voice Syllabus, a mock exam of a Grade 5 candidate, and some tips for maximizing students’ marks on the Exercises and Sight-singing portions of the examination.
In 2012 Susan conducted a number of workshops across Canada for The Royal Conservatory, introducing the 2012 Syllabus and Resonance: A Comprehensive Voice Series, and gave a workshop for ORMTA’s provincial conference. Ms. Ambrose has adjudicated music festivals for voice and choir throughout Canada since 1988 in both large centres and small towns. She has adjudicated both the Manitoba and Ontario Provincial Festivals Susan Ambrose has an extensive list of professional performances to her credit, including: Contessa in Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro, Scottish Opera Tour, UK; Ortlinde in Wagner's Die Walküre with the English National Opera (Mark Elder); Cleopatra in Barber's Anthony and Cleopatra with the Camden Festival (Anthony Shelley), London, England; Ellen Orford in Britten's Peter Grimes at St. John's Smith Square, London; Ravel's L'Enfant and Stravinsky's Rossignol at Covent Garden (David Atherton); Abigaille in Verdi's Nabucco at the Arena di Plovdiv, (Ivanov), Bulgaria; Vitellia in Mozart's La Clemenza di Tito with Orchestra London (Uri Meyer), Canada; and the title role in Strauss's Salome in a CBC broadcast with Orchestra London, (Uri Meyer), Canada. She has also been the understudy for roles including Ortlinde in Die Walküre and the First Lady in Die Zauberflöte at Covent Garden (Sir Colin Davis); the Marschallin in Der Rosenkavalier at Glyndebourne (Bernard Haitink), England; and Ariadne in Ariadne auf Naxos at Glyndebourne (Simon Rattle). She has performed in Verdi's Requiem at Durham Cathedral, England and with the Orchestre Metropolitaine de Montréal (Agnes Grossman), Canada, and in Beethoven's Missa Solemnis with the London Fanshawe Symphonic Orchestra, Canada. Ms. Ambrose has sung in numerous concerts in Canada, the UK, and Germany.
From 2008 to 2012 Susan Ambrose co-compiled the 2012 Voice Syllabus and the fourteen vocal repertoire albums of Resonance: A Comprehensive Voice Series. As part of this project she rewrote the Exam Booklet for Ear Tests and Sight Singing.
Professional Affiliations
National Association of Teachers of Singing
Canadian Music Festival Adjudicators' Association