Lisa Hopkins - Early Life and Training

Early Life and Training

Hopkins was born in Simi Valley, California, and grew up all over the United States and Canada, from Los Angeles to Manhattan, North Dakota, Iowa, Missouri and Utah. Her mother is a Juilliard-trained pianist with whom she continues to collaborate. She attended the Waterford School in Sandy, Utah and began to study voice at age 16.

Hopkins received her B.A. in Theater Studies and Acting from Yale University in 2001. After her freshman year at Yale, she studied at the Scuola Insieme in Grado, Italy. The following summer she played the role of Polly Peachum in The Threepenny Opera at the Chautauqua Institution Music Festival. Upon her return to Yale her sophomore year, she founded the Yale College Opera Company, playing Cleopatra in Handel's Giulio Cesare and performing Poulenc's one-woman opera, La Voix Humaine for her senior project. She also sang the role of Casilda in The Gondoliers for Yale's Gilbert and Sullivan Society, among other roles. Between her junior and senior years at Yale, Hopkins performed on tour as a soprano soloist in 21 multimedia concerts in Graz, Klagenfurt, Salzburg, and Vienna, Austria, while serving as a missionary for the LDS Church.

She received her M.M. in Classical Voice from the Manhattan School of Music in 2003, where she studied with Marlena Malas. In the summer of 2004, she studied at the International Vocal Arts Institute in Tel Aviv, Israel with Trish McCaffrey.