Nottingham-born mezzo-soprano Emily Hodkinson is a graduate of the Alexander Gibson Opera School at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland and the University of York. She was the recipient of a Sybil Tutton Opera Award, the Ena Mitchell Scholarship and the Ulrike Wilson Scholarship, and won the Rodney Gibson Early Music Prize at the 2021 Patricia Routledge National English Song Competition, as well as the Liz Chant Bursary Competition and the John & Barbara Beaumont Bursary Competition.
Recent and future engagements include cover the title role in Handel’s Giulio Cesare and Olga Eugene Onegin (The Grange Festival), Waltraute Die Walküre (Grange Park Opera), Olga Eugene Onegin (Wild Arts), Sylviane The Merry Widow (Glyndebourne Festival), What Dreams May Come and The Vanishing Forest, Romeo I Capuleti e i Montecchi and Nerone and Ottavia L’incoronazione di Poppea (English Touring Opera), and cover Octavian Der Rosenkavalier (Saffron Opera Group). She has also performed Cherubino Le nozze di Figaro with Saffron Opera Group, receiving praise from Opera Magazine as “irresistible”, and premiered John Joubert’s Jane Eyre as part of Grimeborn Opera.
Emily made her Glyndebourne solo debut as Sylviane The Merry Widow, directed by Cal McCrystal and conducted by John Wilson. The production was broadcast on BBC Four and BBC iPlayer. She also made her debut with The Hallé as a soloist in their Christmas Concert at the Royal Concert Hall, Nottingham.
Concert engagements include Angel The Dream of Gerontius (Nottingham Harmonic Choir), Mahler’s Symphony No. 4 (Kew Sinfonia), Mendelssohn’s Elijah, Handel’s Messiah, Elgar’s Sea Pictures, Elgar’s The Music Makers, Rossini’s Petite Messe Solennelle, Beethoven’s Mass in C and Bach’s Mass in B minor. Forthcoming concert engagements include Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 with Winchester Symphony Orchestra, Elgar’s Sea Pictures with Farnborough Symphony Orchestra, Elgar’s The Music Makers and Bach’s Mass in B minor with Nottingham Harmonic Choir.
Her operatic repertoire includes Madame Larina Eugene Onegin, Nancy Albert Herring, Siegrune Die Walküre, Wellgunde Das Rheingold, Hänsel Hänsel und Gretel, Ruggiero Alcina and Charlotte Werther. Emily was an Opera Holland Park Young Artist in 2022, performing Madame Larina Eugene Onegin in the Young Artist performances. She is also a keen recitalist and concert soloist and has performed extensively throughout the UK.
As Olga, mezzo-soprano Emily Hodkinson made a real impression (I see Hodkinson has also sung Larina in this opera for OHP in 2022). Hodkinson’s voice is full, clear and strong; notably, she shone just as much in duet with Tatyana early on as she did in her own aria, an ensemble singer as well as soloist. I would very much like to hear more of her.
Emily Hodkinson makes an effervescent Olga. Although singing at the lower end of her mezzo register, her voice has a light quicksilver timbre.
Mezzo Emily Hodkinson was the finest of the singers, with an appealing slightly smoky timbre.
5 stars
...all the performers – including Hodkinson – excel in their solo turns and together in duets and quartets.
Emily Hodkinson was tall, gawky and irresistible as Cherubino, giving the hormonal teenager’s two arias impressive urgency.
Emily Hodkinson steps out of the committed eight voice chorus to provide a memorable cameo as that rare thing, a politician with a conscience.
Emily Hodkinson's warmly sung, affectionate Nancy was a life-force, constantly encouraging Albert, enjoying her liasons with Sid, while suggesting that if she couldn't tame her Tedd-boy lover with the love of a good woman, she would have the strength to break away
Emily Hodkinson simpered personably as the Minskwoman, a role that found her relishing the spotlight in her opening solo but otherwise undersold her vocal and dramatic potential.
It is amazing what difference a wig and cap can make. Having met Emily Hodkinson at a Young Artists event earlier in the year I was very struck by how different her Madame Larina was from the real Emily. This Larina was very poised and centred, cool almost and she had a Jane Austen-esque sense of floating through life unaware of the little dramas eddying round her.
Emily Hodkinson played Madame Larina with vocal precision and a secure sense of her status.