Press

critical acclaim

…a talented and courageous singer…

-Adam Parker, Charleston Post and Courier

And, indeed, the vocal talent is first-rate…Henley Heyn as Brunnhilde was the dramatic standout, with surpassing presence and delivery.

-Jeremy Reynolds, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Steamy Salome sets Spoleto ablaze

-Perry Tannenbaum, Art on My Sleeve

Henley Heyn, making her operatic debut, imbued her character with welcomed youthfulness and the right combination of angst and distress, obsession and apathy, lust and languor. She embodied Salome through and through.

-Adam Parker, Charleston Post and Courier

Henley Heyn makes a striking Salome. She is a formidable actress, throwing herself fearlessly into the role in a physical feat that conjured memories of the great Hildegard Behrens.

-James L. Paulk, Classical Voice America

As Salome, the phenomenally hellbent dramatic soprano Melanie Henley Heyn brings on the toxic, tragic brew of entitlement, desire, and humiliation that ultimately erupts in a white-hot rage… With outsize emotional and vocal range, Heyn powers through to the oh-so-bitter end.

-Maura Hogan, Charleston City Paper

Soprano Melanie Henley Heyn, was singing professionally for the first time ever in a full-length operatic production – and she was amazing, validating the awesome risk of casting her.

-Perry Tannenbaum, Art on My Sleeve

Spoleto ‘Salome’ sonically sublime, emotionally visceral…Melanie Henley Heyn is completely convincing in the title role. Her soprano is rich and nuanced.

-Lynn Felder, Artzenstuff

Only the title role in Salome offers a ride range of feelings—sensuality, pain, bafflement, exhilaration in newfound power, a sick pleasure mixed perhaps with wistfulness in her final remarks to the prophet’s head. American soprano Melanie Henley Heyn—who, incredibly, made her debut in this production—had the emotional depth to convey those moods and sang eloquently throughout her range, especially in the softer passages.

-Lawrence Toppman, Opera News

The audacity of her overture to Jokanaan seems fueled by privilege more than vanity, so there’s enough youthful simplicity left in her to make Herod’s advances a stunning violation. Yet I’ve never heard more powerful demands for Jokanaan’s head…Heyn is also supreme in those moments.

-Perry Tannenbaum, Queen City Nerve

Melanie Henley Heyn sang beautifully and expressively across her range…

-Lawrence Toppman, of note: WDAV National Public Radio

But it’s the production concept by Caurier and Leiser that will live longest in my memory — and Heyn’s performance that crowned it.

-Perry Tannenbaum, Queen City Nerve

Concert of the year?…The prize for the year’s most inventive–indeed, provocative–classical concert goes to the one presented Thursday night in the Nasher Sculpture Center’s Soundings series.

-Scott Cantrell, Dallas News

…provocative, even erotic…elegantly sung, with incandescent tone…

-Scott Cantrell, Dallas News

[Henley Heyn] concentrated on capturing exquisite intricacies of sonorities…giving the impression of whispering truisms in each listener’s ears.

-Mark Swed, Los Angeles Times

Heyn, a formidable soprano and actress, commanded the runaway emotional rollercoaster ridden by Mahler’s (here librettist) unrequited lover. She ranged, fiercely untrammeled, not a whit arch or reserved, through her sharply jaundiced vision of birds and flowers, ironic dialogue with cheery finch and bright bluebell; weathered a knife deep in her breast at the mere thought of blue eyes and blond locks; and, under a blossoming linden tree, let us all relive youth’s inevitable reprieve and resurrection.

-Fred Bouchard, Boston Musical Intelligencer

…performed, while hidden by a screen, with a luxuriantly gorgeous tone and expressive quality by soprano Melanie Henley Heyn…

-Wayne Lee Gray, Theater Jones

Angelica was sung and acted brilliantly by Melanie Henley Heyn,
whose radiant soprano shimmered with celestial light.

-Nino Pantano, Brooklyn Daily Eagle

“Eine Gräfin aus dem Bilderbuch…”
A Countess out of a picture book…

– Sieglinde Pfabigan, Der neue Merker

“Wäre ich Intendant/in, würde ich…als nächstes die Gräfin [engagieren].”
If I were Intendant, I would engage the Countess next.

– Sieglinde Pfabigan, Der neue Merker

“Sie sangen und spielten Mozart. Nichts sonst.
Als wär’s das Selbstverständlichste der Welt.”
They sang and performed Mozart. Nothing else.
As if it were the most self-evident act in the world.

– Sieglinde Pfabigan, Der neue Merker

“Die zwischenmenschlichen Beziehungen hätten klarer nicht herausgearbeitet sein können.”
The relationships between the characters couldn’t have been more clearly portrayed.

– Sieglinde Pfabigan, Der neue Merker

“…schönstimmige Gräfin der Melanie Henley Heyn…[die] gute Bogen formte.”
…the beautifully sung Countess of Melanie Henley Heyn, who sang with excellent line.

– Sieglinde Pfabigan, Der neue Merker

“Die Tove sang Melanie Henley Heyn…Sie gefiel mir am besten, weil sie das meiste aus ihrer Rolle machen konnte und auch das Herz anrührte.”
Melanie Henley Heyn sang Tove. I liked her the best because she made the most out of her role and also touched the heart.

– Hans Peter Nowak, Der neue Merker

A young dramatic soprano to watch.

– Hilde Zadek, Internationaler Hilde Zadek Gesangswettbewerb