Sarah Brailey

A native of Wisconsin, GRAMMY Award-winning soprano Sarah Brailey enjoys a versatile career that defies categorization. Praised by The New York Times for her “radiant, liquid tone,” and “exquisitely phrased” singing, and by Opera UK for “a sound of remarkable purity,” she is a prolific vocal soloist, cellist, ensemble singer, recording artist, and educator.

Among her many career highlights, she has appeared as a soloist with The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra in Handel’s Messiah, serenaded the Mona Lisa with John Zorn’s Madrigals at the Louvre Museum in Paris, and performed with Kanye West and GRAMMY Award-winning alternative-classical vocal band Roomful of Teeth at the Hollywood Bowl. Other memorable engagements include Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915 with the Colorado Symphony, recording cello and vocal soundscapes for the Fog x FLO public art installation in Boston’s Emerald Necklace; and inhabiting the role of The Soul in the world premiere recording of Dame Ethel Smyth’s The Prison, for which she received the 2020 GRAMMY for Best Classical Solo Vocal Album. Notable recent and upcoming projects include Julia Wolfe’s Her Story with the Lorelei Ensemble and the Boston, Chicago, Nashville, National, and San Francisco Symphony Orchestras; John Zorn works with Barbara Hannigan at the Elbphilharmonie; and the role of Prinze Ozia in Alessandro Scarlatti’s La Giuditta with Haymarket Opera.

Sarah is a featured soloist on several GRAMMY-nominated albums, including New York Polyphony’s Sing Thee Nowell, Wild Up’s recording of Christopher Cerrone’s The Branch Will not Break, The Clarion Choir’s recording of the Rachmaninoff All-Night Vigil, Alexander Kastalsky’s Memory Eternal to the Fallen Heroes, and  Maximilian Steinberg’s Passion Week, as well as the world premiere recording of Du Yun’s Angel’s Bone, winner of the 2017 Pulitzer Prize in Music. She sang the role of the impish fairy Verveine on the world premiere recording of Le Dernier Sorcier by Pauline Viardot, also featuring mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton and bass-baritone Eric Owens. Additional discography includes multiple world premiere recordings with the Lorelei Ensemble: David Lang love fail, Scott Ordway North Woods, James Kallembach Antigone, and Jessica Meyer I long and seek after.

Sarah maintains a private voice studio and has conducted master classes and artist residencies at institutions all over the country, including the Peabody Conservatory, Ithaca College, Harvard University, Duke University, Cornell University, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, among others. She has served on the summer faculties of the St. Thomas Fifth Avenue Girl Chorister Course in New York City, the Madison Bach Musicians, the Northwestern Bach Academy, and the Nashotah House Seminary. She currently teaches on the voice faculty at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and is the Director of Vocal Studies at the University of Chicago.  

Dedicated to building artistic communities and opportunities for young artists, Sarah is a co-founder of Just Bach, a monthly concert series in Madison, Wisconsin where she is also the Artistic Director of the Handel Aria Competition, a showcase for emerging professional singers dedicated to highlighting Handel's extensive vocal repertoire. 

Sarah is a member of Beyond Artists, a coalition of artists that donate a percentage of their concert fees to organizations they care about. Devoted to helping sustain a healthy planet, Sarah supports NRDC, Friends of the Boundary Waters Wilderness, and the Animal Welfare Institute. www.SarahBrailey.com.