BIOGRAPHY

Praised for bringing “great tenderness” and “seductive power” to her singing, Canadian soprano Rachel Allen is quickly establishing herself as an expressive and stylistically versatile performer. Now based in London, she is a 2025 Young Artist with The Musicians’ Company, Brighton Early Music Festival, and City Music Foundation. With a particular affinity for Baroque repertoire, Rachel has performed with leading period ensembles in both Canada and the UK.

Her operatic roles include Dido in Dido and Aeneas (Cadogan Hall; Overstrand Festival of Early Music), Poppea in L’incoronazione di Poppea, Morgana in Alcina, and Susanna in Le nozze di Figaro. For her Venus in Blow’s Venus and Adonis at the Ryedale Festival, Opera Magazine praised her “pleasing period-style soprano… [she] moved with a grace not often found among singers.” As a concert soloist her repertoire spans Monteverdi to Mahler. Recent highlights include Bach’s Cantata 36, Handel’s Dixit Dominus, Mozart’s Mass in C Minor, and Mendelssohn’s Paulus and Elijah. In 2025 she gave her Wigmore Hall recital debut, followed by performances at Sinfonia Smith Square and The Lute Society. She looks forward to upcoming recitals with Londinium Consort at St Martin-in-the-Fields, Saffron Hall, and the Brighton Early Music Festival.

Since 2021, Rachel has sung with the Monteverdi Choir, touring internationally under John Eliot Gardiner and taking part in projects led by Peter Whelan, Christophe Rousset, Masaaki Suzuki, and Pablo Heras-Casado. She has also appeared with the BBC Singers, Gabrieli Consort & Players, and the London Choral Sinfonia. In competitions, Rachel was a semi-finalist in the Cesti International Baroque Singing Competition (2024) and Concours Corneille (2025), and winner of The Musicians’ Company New Elizabethan Award (2024) with Londinium Consort.

Rachel holds a master’s degree from the Royal College of Music, where she studied with Alison Wells. At the RCM she was the Robert Anderson Award holder and was supported by a Help Musicians UK Postgraduate Award. There she performed as a featured soloist in Jacquet de la Guerre’s L’Isle de Délos and Bach’s Easter Oratorio and was a finalist in the Brooks Van der Pump English Song Competition. Her scholarly interest in historical performance led to co-authoring a Grove Music Online entry on the eighteenth-century Handelian soprano Élisabeth Duparc (“La Francesina”), in collaboration with Dr Cheryll Duncan while an undergraduate at the Royal Northern College of Music.

Originally from Victoria, British Columbia, Rachel received her early musical training at the Victoria Conservatory of Music, studying with sopranos Nancy Argenta and Ingrid Attrot. As a student she performed with Victoria Baroque, La Modestine, the Pacific Baroque Festival, Victoria Philharmonic Choir, Pacific Opera Victoria, and the VCM Opera Studio.