“Blessed with a voice that is lovely and rich” (St. Louis Post Dispatch), soprano Leann Schuering is in demand as a vocalist and voice teacher in the St. Louis region. She has performed solo engagements and leading roles with many of the area’s most prominent performing arts organizations, including the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, The Muny, the St. Louis Shakespeare Festival, Union Avenue Opera, St. Louis Art Song, The Kingsbury Ensemble, and others.
In summer of 2022 she will return to Union Avenue Opera as Charlotte Malcolm in Stephen Sondheim's A Little Night Music. In the fall she will offer a new solo recital, "The Moon and I," featuring songs with a lunar theme by Claude Debussy, Osvaldo Golijov, Rhian Samuel, and others. She also will appear as a Carmelite in the Saint Louis Symphony's performance of the final scene from Dialogues of the Carmelites, featuring Jeanine De Bique as Sister Blanche. She will round out the year with her first appearance with Opera Edwardsville as a part of their 12 Days of Opera Edwardsville virtual series.
2020 could not keep her down, as the St. Louis performing arts community rose to the challenge and met its audiences outdoors and socially distanced. Leann performed Titania in St. Louis Shakespeare Festival’s A Late Summer Night’s Stroll (in partnership with Opera Theatre of St. Louis), a theatrical walking tour inspired by A Midsummer Night’s Dream. She also performed regularly on the outdoor concert series of the Kingsbury Ensemble, St. Louis' premier early music organization, and several impromptu lawn concerts organized by members of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra.
Other St. Louis career highlights include Josephine in Union Avenue Opera’s H.M.S. Pinafore, a production that was “highlighted by her magnificent soprano” (Ladue News), Miss Wordsworth in Union Avenue Opera’s Albert Herring starring Christine Brewer, for which Leann was applauded for her “splended work” (KDHX), and Vivaldi’s Gloria with the St. Louis Symphony conducted by Nicholas McGegan. She has also performed roles with Winter Opera Saint Louis (Sylviane in A Merry Widow, Sally in Die Fledermaus) and Gateway Opera (Hetty in The Clever Artifice of Harriet and Margaret).
Outside of St. Louis, Leann has performed with the Toledo Symphony Orchestra, the Great Lakes Chamber Orchestra, the Adrian Symphony Orchestra, Opera MODO, LOFTRecital, and others. She was one of ten singers chosen from across the country to attend the Art Song Festival at Baldwin Wallace in 2017, and she attended SongFest in Los Angeles as a Stern Fellow in 2009. There she studied and performed with pianists Martin Katz, Margo Garrett, and Graham Johnson; and American composers Lori Laitman, Tom Cipullo, John Musto, and Jake Heggie. She continues to champion the performance of art song in her own community.
Leann is a two-time St. Louis District Winner and Third Place Midwest Region Winner of the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. In 2013 she was awarded Third Place at the International Czech and Slovak Singing Competition in Montréal, and in 2014 she was an International Semi-Finalist at the Hans Gabor Belvedere Opera Competition in Düsseldorf.
Leann has ten years of teaching experience at the collegiate level, including Applied Voice, Opera Workshop, Diction, and Vocal Literature. She is currently on the voice faculty of Webster University in St. Louis and has taught at Millikin University, the University of Michigan, and the University of Illinois. She has a Level II certification in Somatic Voicework, a certification in Soul Ingredients ®: Pedagogy of Soul Singing, and is a certified yoga instructor through the National Exercise Trainer’s Association. She holds a BA in Environmental Studies from the University of Chicago, an MM in Voice from the University of Illinois, and a DMA in Voice from the University of Michigan.