2006

RONNITA MILLER

Mezzo-Soprano

L.A. oPERA

I grew up in a musical family. My mom sang gospel music, my cousins played the violin, and we all loved Motown and oldies. But opera? No one listened to opera, and I never imagined I would become an opera singer. In high school, I followed a cute boy into chorus and ended up singing the solo at the Christmas concert. I went on to Juilliard and then the young artists’ program at the L.A. Opera, where I had the chance to perform alongside legends and really hone my craft.

When Richard Wagner’s Ring cycle came to the L.A. Opera, I knew it was an historic event, given the resources needed to produce it. We were thrilled that Eli and Edye Broad had the vision to support something so ambitious. That Ring production was a catalyst in my career; since then I’ve performed in Ring cycles in Berlin and San Francisco.

The challenge in singing Wagner is making each word of the story special in the context of all this glorious music. It’s a physical, not just musical, feat. It takes strength to move on the stage and to sing, to shift your balance, to not lock your knees. I learned so much being on stage at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion playing Flosshilde—how every decision I make influences where I’m going next, much like in life, and how to take my time and breathe.

When you’re young, you rush. You don’t want to make people wait. But there’s something beautiful in that silence before you make a sound, in that moment of inspiration before you create art.

Many people perceive opera as irrelevant to their lives, or as only for the elite. But if it’s relevant to me—a Black girl from central Florida, from a lower-middle-income family—it can be relevant to anyone. Opera became a refuge for me because it’s about real people struggling with real things—race, love, class, violence. Through opera we can tell these stories, and in listening to them we find inspiration and truth about our humanity.