New York-born and bred soprano and librettist Heather O’Donovan is a multi-hyphenate storyteller-artist.

Throughout her studies, Heather enjoyed performing roles and scenes from the core repertoire, including Cendrillon (La Fée), Monteverdi’s The Coronation of Poppea (Drusilla), and Die Zauberflöte (Papagena). She has found a particular passion, however, in excavating lesser-known classical works and in serving as a champion for contemporary American opera.

An avid performer of new music theater, Heather has originated roles in world premieres of Andrew Lovett’s The Analysing Engine (Professor Platt) and Flannery Cunningham’s Weehawken (Elizabeth Schuyler Hamilton). She is also a frequent participant in workshops of new American operas, such as Julian Wachner’s Rev. 23 (Fury 1), and in concert premieres of new song cycles, micro-operas, and other shorter-form works.

Heather also finds particular joy in delving into the more obscure gems of the classical repertoire. During the first year of her graduate studies Heather reveled in bringing physical life to the role of Lucia in Nino Rota’s rarely-performed radio opera I due timidi. Her proudest project to date remains her undergraduate senior thesis, a singable English-language translation of Victor Massé’s once-immensely-popular Les Noces de Jeannette, a charming one-act which she produced and performed in chamber opera adaptation with the generous support of the Princeton University Department of Music.

Heather is an active librettist and lyricist. Deriving from a deep love for and fascination with language and the field of translation, Heather devoted the pandemic-era shutdown (arriving on the tails of her final year of graduate studies) to indulging a budding interest in libretto writing. She has been delighted to work (often remotely) alongside composer and fellow performing artist collaborators to bring nuanced characters with complex needs and desires to vivid life. Heather’s librettos have been commissioned and presented by the Manhattan School of Music’s Contemporary Opera Ensemble, Yale University, and Paris’ Fondation des États-Unis.

As a writer on topics of classical music, Heather contributes articles, profiles, interviews, and video content on a regular basis to New York's classical music radio station WQXR and develops stories and profiles for Princeton University's Department of Music. Her opera and recital program notes have appeared in the auditoriums of Carnegie Hall, the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, the Aspen Music Festival and School, and Santa Fe Opera. Outside of the music space, Heather's articles, both under her byline and ghostwritten, have appeared on BuzzFeed, FluentU, and Fast Company.

Heather graduated summa cum laude from Princeton University with a bachelor’s degree in music and received her master’s degree from the Manhattan School of Music. Previous studies also include a study-abroad term at London’s Royal College of Music.