Hailed by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette as a “beautifully voiced singer-actor" and by the American Record Guide as a mezzo-soprano of “gorgeous expressive singing” Raquel Winnica Young was a finalist of the Vocal Art Song Discovery Series DC, two-time winner of the Pittsburgh Concert Society Major Artist Competition and a finalist for The American Prize in Art Song and Oratorio.
Raquel is equally comfortable in the world of early music, chamber opera, contemporary opera, chamber music and oratorio. Her career has taken her to concert halls and opera houses across the Americas and Europe such as Teatro Colón of Buenos Aires, Teatro Nacional Sucre of Quito, Severance Hall (Cleveland), Metropolitan Museum of Art, Casa da Música (Porto), Teatro Comunale Claudio Abbado (Ferrara).
As a soloist of oratorio and chamber music Raquel has also participated in major international festivals, like Bach Festival in (Lausanne), Festival Martha Argerich, (Buenos Aires), Festival Llao Llao, (Río Negro), Festival Camino de las Estancias, (Córdoba) ; and closer to home at the Strings Music Festival, (Steamboat), Colorado.
Specializing in Spanish and Latin-American baroque music, with a deep interest in the influence and transformation of the Spanish language and its origins across the centuries, Raquel has performed with numerous early music ensembles. In the US, she appeared in concert with Chatham Baroque, The Newberry Consort, The Rose Ensemble, and Apollo’s Fire. She recently appeared in an online project about the life and music of Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz with Les Délices, a baroque ensemble from Cleveland.
In the world of opera she has performed title roles across the globe in productions of Cosí fan Tutte, L'enfant et les sortilèges, Frida, Ainadamar, Medeamaterial, María de Buenos Aires, Hansel und Gretel, Armide, Orfeo and Euridice, Dido and Aeneas, Winter's Tale (a baroque pastiche) and a concert version of composer Efrain Amaya's opera Constellations.
Raquel is also the co-founder of several chamber music projects: the early music duo Musica Mundana with harpsichordist Justin Wallace, the heterodox chamber group Bell’Art Ensemble and the classical/improv hybrid group Tierradentro, with whom she explores rhythms and folk songs from Argentina.
Born in Córdoba, Argentina, Ms. Winnica Young holds a degree from the Instituto de Arte del Teatro Colon and an Artist Diploma from Duquesne University. She is currently pursuing a Masters Degree in Advance Studies in Theatre through Universidad Nacional La Rioja UNIR.
As a pedagogue, Ms. Winnica Young is Adjunct Faculty in Voice at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, where she teaches Applied Voice and Vocal Repertoire and Literature. She resides in Pittsburgh with her husband Lenny Young and their dog Luna.
