For many young children in the South Bronx, opera does not seem like a reality. But one mezzo-soprano, Linda Collazo, is challenging that notion as she gears up to perform at Lincoln Center this Saturday.
Collazo, also an alto soloist, was born and raised in Hunts Point to an Ecuadorian mother and a Puerto Rican father. She lived a sheltered life as a youth but she participated in many extracurricular activities thanks to her mother. The free music programs that Collazo attended, such as The Point CDC, taught her to play piano and electric bass. She started to take music seriously with the classes by also joining a band and songwriting. But it wasn’t until she was accepted into Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts in Manhattan that she started her path to becoming an opera singer.
The 27 year old always wanted to sing but was too shy and lacked confidence in her abilities. But when applying to LaGuardia, she still auditioned for voice along with voice and art. She got into all three programs or studios as LaGuardia calls them. The first week in piano, Collazo was placed in the most advanced class. That decision made her panic and change to voice the next day. She did not go into voice expecting to learn opera, but she did as it’s the core curriculum for the voice program.
College was the moment Collazo considered doing it professionally. She went to Macaulay Honors College at Queens College and the Aaron Copland School of Music.
“I was considering quitting actually, because I didn’t see myself in the art form as a person of color or as a Latina girl. And I didn’t understand it, even though I was good at it, I didn’t relate to it,” Collazo said.
She couldn’t relate to opera until her teacher showed her Spanish songs. She found out about Spanish composer Manuel de Falla and Spanish mezzo-soprano Teresa Berganza. The legendary Berganza is one of Collazo’s biggest inspirations.
Then she met Pablo Zinger, a Uruguayan conductor as well as pianist, after winning the Bronx Arts Ensemble Young Artist Competition. Collazo credits him for her first paid solo gig. He furthered her education on Spanish-language repertoire, in particular zarzuela, which is essentially Spanish opera. College and Zinger pushed her to see opera as a career so she could “show that side of the opera world that wasn’t exactly mainstream,” especially at that time.
The Spanish and Latin American repertoire that Collazo discovered brings her joy in her career. But the Latin American repertoire has also been really meaningful and important to her. For example, finding an Ecuadorian composer whose music centers indigeneity when she has indigenous roots and is half Ecuadorian. Collazo still needs to learn German, French and Italian repertoire as it’s a major part of being in opera, but she will always try to incorporate Spanish music in her opera when she can, she said.
Music is a big part of Collazo’s life. She owes a lot to the art form and her mother for introducing it to her. It was an outlet that got her out of negative spaces and aided in her brain development after a seizure she suffered from as a toddler. Her mother put her in numerous free and cheap music classes to assist in her healing and memory. Through music, she had the opportunity to travel and learn about different parts of the world. Most importantly, music brings her happiness and Collazo thinks all kids deserve access to music programs, especially kids from the South Bronx.
This is one of the reasons she works for The Point as a performing arts coordinator to provide music education that same way the Point did for her. She also provides private voice and piano lessons in the South Bronx to give back to her community. Collazo feels there is a need and a gap for music education in the South Bronx.
“I think it’s unfair that there aren’t really music schools here. There aren’t really art schools here. And it’s because the South Bronx in particular is very very neglected by the government, and I guess by investors, I don’t know if that’s the right terminology. But that breaks my heart,” she said. “And I think that children in this area, in particular, really deserve that chance.”
Being given that chance has led the South Bronx native to iconic venues such as Carnegie Hall this past March and now Lincoln Center this Saturday. She will be performing a solo from Dan Forrest’s “Jubilate Deo.”
Collazo could not help but burst into tears when she received the offers to perform at these venues.
It’s also a cyclical moment for the performer to be back at these two venues. She sang at Lincoln Center for high school graduation in a choir and was a soloist at 18, performing at Carnegie’s Hall small theater — Weill Recital Hall. She’s come a long way since high school.
“The opera is extremely difficult. There’s so many singers, and they’re all talented, gifted, incredible, from the top universities of Juilliard, Curtis, Yale and even they struggle,” she said. “And I think, to have been given that privilege as a girl from the Bronx, it was just a very affirming moment for me.
“I think it’s about more than just me now. I think it’s about just knowing what people from the Bronx can do. And breaking stereotypes.”
Tickets to Linda Collazo’s Lincoln Center debut at Alice Tully Hall on April 15 at 7 p.m. are available here.
Reach Demetria Osei-Tutu at oseitutud13@gmail.com. For more coverage, follow us on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram @bronxtimes
