Soprano Raquel González from Lawrence, Kansas returns for her third season of Washington National Opera's Domingo-Cafritz Young Artist Program, where she sings Countess in the Emerging Artist Performance of Le nozze di Figaro and the title role in the Emerging Artist Performance of Madama Butterfly. She also appears this season as soprano soloist in Beethoven’s 9th Symphony with the Lansing Symphony Orchestra, and in Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis with the Los Angeles Master Chorale. She debuts with Syracuse Opera as Tatyana in Eugene Onegin.
In 2015-16, Ms. González sang Micaëla in the Emerging Artist Performance of Carmen at WNO, where she also sang The Sandman in Hansel and Gretel. She then made her role debut as Desdemona in Otello with the Boston Youth Symphony Orchestra and returned to sing Mimì in La bohème at The Glimmerglass Festival, where she previously sang First Lady in The Magic Flute as a 2015 Young Artist. In her first season at WNO she sang Mimì in the Emerging Artist Performance of La bohème then sang Sister Claire and covered Blanche de la Force in Dialogues of the Carmelites.
As a Gerdine Young Artist at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, she appeared in the world premiere of Terence Blanchard's Champion and returned to OTSL in the summer of 2014 as a Festival Artist singing First Lady and covering Blanche de la Force.
At The Juilliard School Ms. González was seen as Tatyana, Arminda (La finta giardiniera), Dido (Dido and Aeneas), and Mélisse (Armide). She spent several summers at the Chautauqua Institution singing such roles as Magda (La Rondine), Donna Anna (Don Giovanni), Adina (L'elisir d'amore), and Lauretta (Gianni Schicchi).
In concert, she has appeared with the New York Festival of Song at Alice Tully Hall where she also appeared several times with William Christie and Juilliard415. Ms. González was the soprano soloist in Handel’s Messiah with the Charleston Symphony Orchestra and made her debut with the New York Philharmonic as soprano soloist in Beethoven's Ninth Symphony at Avery Fisher Hall. A 2016 Mid-Atlantic Region Finalist of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, she has also been awarded prizes from the Liederkranz Foundation and the Gerda Lissner Foundation. She earned her master's degree as a Toulmin Scholar from The Juilliard School, where she also completed her undergraduate studies studying with Marlena Malas.