Home » Jazz Musicians » Sara Bielanski
Sara Bielanski
An avid jazz musician, Sara has performed with legends Sheila Jordan, Ra-Kalam Bob Moses, Rufus Reid, Jim McNeely, Stan Strickland, and Peter Cassino, and had the distinct pleasure of studying with the late Charlie Banacos. Bielanski studied at the esteemed Jazz in July program at UMass Amherst, as well as the Lake Placid Jazz Institute in upstate New York. She has sung at major Boston and New York venues, most notably at Ryles, Acton Jazz Cafe, Top of the Hub, the Boston Esplanade, Club OBERON, and in New York at the JP Morgan Penthouse.
Bielanski's collaborations in the classical genre have most notably included Opera Boston, Tuscia Opera Festival in Rome, Boston Ballet, MetroWest Opera, Chorus Pro Musica, Commonwealth Opera, Boston Modern Orchestra Project, Masterworks Chorale, Juventas New Music Ensemble, Holyoke Civic Symphony, and the Boston Pops Chorus.
Bielanski has participated in several distinguished vocal competitions, placing first in the Boston NATS Competition in the Professional Division. She was a finalist in the Peter Elvins Competition for Professional Singers in January 2012, and a national semi-finalist in the Lois Alba Vocal Competition in Houston, Texas in May 2012.
Recording projects include a demo of opera choruses for BOSE, ensemble work with Boston Modern Orchestra Project, and a Bob Dylan project for WICN radio.
Bielanski is a founding member of the Boston-based classical improvisation group The Meltdown Incentive and also collaborates with THE VORTEX (a series for new and improvised music).
Educated at UMass Amherst (BMus, Voice Performance) and the Longy School of Music, Bielanski graduated with a Masters in Modern American Music from the latter, which allowed her the unique opportunity to study both the classical and jazz idioms simultaneously. Additional studies include the Oberlin Conservatory of Music.
Tags
Sara Bielanski: From the Heart
by Tyran Grillo
Vocalist Sara Bielanski's debut album is heartfelt in the most descriptive sense possible for being inspired by the open-heart surgery that saved her life in 2011. Bielanski, who comes from a classical background yet has always nurtured a love for jazz standards, decided it was time to let that love shine in the studio, and the results are as affirming as their catalyst was close to being fatal. From the smoothly ushered first lines of “Night Lights," Bielanski's ...
read moreSara Bielanski: From the Heart
by Victor L. Schermer
This is vocalist Sara Bielanski's debut album, and for it she brought together a group of fine musicians with connections to the Berklee School of Music and The New England Conservatory, institutions where for well over more than a half-century many of our most outstanding players have gotten their jump start. Bielanski herself is a fine crossover singer and vocal teacher based in Cambridge, so the album has a touch of the sophisticated New England Back Bay feeling of those ...
read more"...the album has a touch of the sophisticated New England Back Bay feeling of those Boston Brahmin families and their Victorian homes. Gastronomically speaking, the album could be compared with a meal of salad, oysters, and steak..."
-Victor L. Schermer, All About Jazz
"Exceptional talent." - Newburyport News
"Sara Bielanski, as the playful Spring Beauty, Snegurochka’s mother, opens the opera. Although Harvard University’s Lowell Hall is not an ideal opera stage, Bielanski’s bright voice rings clear throughout the hall." - Arts Fuse
"Bielanski...delivers some of the most mystifying and beautiful lines of the production. [She] proves that her smooth voice can be a versatile instrument. Making use of a melancholic undertone, Bielanski skillfully shapes the lush phrases and drives them forward with a pulsating passion." - Arts Fuse
Photos
Music
Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson
