Givonna Joseph

New Orleans native Givonna Joseph is a Loyola College of Music Alumna in vocal performance and music therapy. She joins us to teach Opera, Classical Music and Race: 500 Years of Musicians and Composers of African Descent in Classical Music and Opera.

As Founder and Artistic Director of OperaCréole, Ms. Joseph’s research on 19th Century New Orleans free classical composers of color has been featured in The New Yorker, Southern Living magazine, and on NPR. and she was previously honored as a "Standard Bearer " of Louisiana culture on "Le Grand Tour" on France TV.

The company, founded with her daughter Aria in 2011, has received The Gambit newspaper affiliated Classical Arts Awards in 2019 and 2018, for their creation of an original opera Les Lions de la Reconstruction, in celebration of New Orleans’ Tricentennial, and their production of Lucien Lambert’s lost opera La Flamenca. They received a nomination in 2013 for their production of  Samuel Coleridge Taylor's lost opera Thelma. 

The international mezzo-soprano has been featured in many New Orleans Opera productions, works with their Education Department and serves on their Advisory Board. She has also served on the Board of Directors of the Alliance Française de la Nouvelle-Orléans and The Louisiana Creole Research Association. 

Photo credit to NOLAVieux Photography.