Kimberly Beasley, soprano
Performer, Professor, Director
Singing in all styles, Kimberly has performed with the Jacksonville Symphony Orchestra, the Northwest Festival Orchestra in Chicago, Southwest Michigan Symphony, Elmhurst Symphony, the Northwest Indiana Symphony, DuPage Opera Theatre, the New Philharmonic Orchestra, Light Opera Works, Friday Musicale, Music@Main, Jacksonville Chamber Music Society, Jacksonville University Orchestra, the Grant Park Symphony Chorus and the Lyric Opera of Chicago Chorus at venues such as the Times-Union Center in Jacksonville, the Star Plaza in Indiana, Chicago’s Millennium Park , and the Civic Opera House in Chicago. Roles include Micaëla, Dorine, Serpina, Rosina, Cinderella, Angelica, Josephine, Barbarina, and Cio-cio San in productions of Fidelio, Turandot, Into the Woods, Suor Angelica, Barber of Seville, Tartuffe, H.M.S. Pinafore, Carmen, Marriage of Figaro, and Madama Butterfly. She was also an original founding member of the vocal group Vox3 which is still performing in Chicago.
As a Director, Kimberly focuses on archival research and study to bring her shows and characters to life. Research at Harvard and the Kurt Weill Foundation inspired her productions of Little Women, the Musical, which won awards for Best Actor and Best Scenic Design from Broadway World, and the Jacksonville premiere of Street Scene, an American Opera, which was awarded the University Performance grant in 2013 by the Kurt Weill Foundation. Research at the Oriental Institute at the University of Chicago was behind her recent production of Aida, the Musical. Other productions include Light in the Piazza, Les Misérables, Hot Mikado, Gianni Schicchi, A...My Name is Alice, A Grand Night for Singing, and Children of Eden. She has also written her own opera review entitled, Opera Goes Pop!, which was performed by Jacksonville students in 2014. The spring 2017 performance of There’s a Moon Out Tonight: Doo Wop Songs from 1954-1963 in the Black Box Theatre at JU was generously reviewed and recommended by NPR’s Glen Fisher. In Chicago, she served as the music director, to critical acclaim, of a production of The Last Five Years for OneTheatre as well as music directing The Ballad of Baby Doe and Children of Eden for Valparaiso University. Other credits include The Magic Flute, West Side Story, Hello, Dolly!, Fiddler on the Roof, and Barber of Seville. Her 2018 production of Into the Woods at Jacksonville University received the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival Region IV award for Excellence in Directing.
She has taught at Jacksonville University since 2008 and her students can be seen performing in Broadway tours, on cruise ships, as members of young artist programs, in television and film, as well as with equity theaters across the country. She has taught university courses in applied theory, opera scenes, vocal pedagogy, music theatre workshop, and opera history at Jacksonville University, Valparaiso University, Northwestern University, and the Graham School of the University of Chicago. She is currently an Associate Professor of Voice at Jacksonville University.
Kimberly holds a Bachelor's in Music Theatre from the University of Colorado, a Master of Music from Valparaiso University and a post-graduate Certificate of Vocal Performance from Northwestern University where she studied with Sunny Joy Langton and coached with Sherrill Milnes.
Her CD Fashion Sense: Songs in Recital was released in 2015. Her book entitled Dramatism and Musical Theater: Experiments in Rhetorical Performance was released in 2021 by Peter Lang Publishing.