About
Young British soprano Sumei Bao-Smith is in regular demand as a soloist and choral singer across the UK and abroad. She is a recent graduate of Trinity College, Cambridge, where she studied French and Spanish alongside a Choral Scholarship in the world-leading chapel choir, and is now based in London.
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Sumei is a Brighton Early Music Festival Young Artist for the '24/​'25 season, in which performed the Filia role in Carissimi's Jephte. Other '24/'25 season solo highlights include Bach's St. Matthew Passion with The Three Spires Singers, Bach's St John Passion with The Cornerstone Chamber Choir, Orff's Carmina Burana with BBC National Chorus of Wales as part of the Brecon Choir Festival, Belinda in Purcell's Dido and Aeneas with East Sussex Bach Choir, Purcell's King Arthur with John Hancorn, Finzi's In terra pax with Cambridge University Symphony Chorus and East Anglia Chamber Orchestra, Mendelssohn's Psalm 42 with Bryanston Choral Society and Medieval Carols and Wassails with BREMF Community Choir.​​ Recent solo highlights include Mozart's Requiem (Festival Musique en l'Île, Paris '22 and '23), Bach's St John Passion (Paddington Ensemble), Handel's Messiah (Woodbridge Choral Society), Vivaldi's Gloria and Nulla in mundo pax sincera, Mozart’s Vesperae Solennes de Confessore, Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater (Bryanston Sinfonia), Mendelssohn’s Psalm 42 (Trinity Singers), and Britten’s A Ceremony of Carols (Paris Choral Society), amongst others. Her operatic roles include Eurydice in Offenbach's Orphée aux enfers, Adele in Johann Strauss II's Die Fledermaus, Lucia in Britten's The Rape of Lucretia, and Cupid in John Blow's Venus and Adonis. Whilst at Cambridge, Sumei was fortunate to be a Sir Arthur Bliss Lieder Scheme Scholar '21/'22 and '23/'24, through which she received regular art song coaching from Joseph Middleton and masterclasses with Sir Thomas Allen, Mark Padmore and Nicky Spense. She regularly put on concerts and recitals in Cambridge's many college chapels, with repertoire ranging from Couperin's Trois leçons de ténèbres to Bernstein songs.
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Equally at home on the choral platform, she has performed in concerts and recordings with The Tallis Scholars, Polyphony, VOCES8 Foundation Choir, London Contemporary Orchestra, London Choral Sinfonia, and Arts for the Heart of England, amongst others. She is a beneficiary of Sestina Music's Next Generation Mentoring Programme '24/'25, and she features as a soloist on recordings with London Choral Sinfonia, Corvus Consort, Continuum, Accordare Choir, and The Choir of Trinity College, Cambridge. She is also a member of vocal jazz group, Lo-Five. This season, she looks forward to engagements with BBC Singers, The Tallis Scholars, The English Concert, Polyphony, VOCES8 Foundation, Chamber Choir Ireland, Cambridge Singers, London Choral Sinfonia, Corvus Consort and Continuum, amongst others.
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