Susan Gritton is an English soprano who made her breakthrough to singing principal roles in 1999.
After studying botany at Oxford and London Universities she moved her avocational voice training up to a professional level, then took up singing as a career. She first came to prominence when she won the coveted Kathleen Ferrier Memorial Award in 1994.
This resulted in her solo recital debut at London's Wigmore Hall, with
Eugene Asti as accompanist. She joined
Graham Johnson in the International Songmakers' series, and made extensive appearances in recital throughout England, especially in summer festivals, appearing at the Lichfield, Arundel, Aldeburgh, Cheltenham, Harrowgate, and City of London Festivals, as well as in the Salzburg Mozartwoche. In 1996 she was invited to appear three times in the BBC Henry Wood Promenade Concerts. One of her early festival appearances was at the Istanbul Festival where she sang the part of Blondchen in
Mozart's Die Entführung aus dem Serail in the city where the story is set.
The first few years in her operatic career were in smaller and character parts, such as the First Niece in
Britten's Peter Grimes, Frasquita in
Bizet's Carmen, Clarine and Thalie in
Rameau's Platée, Xenia in
Mussorgsky's Boris Godunov, Sister Constance in
Poulenc's Dialogues des Carmelites, the Mermaid in Weber's Oberon, and Tiny in
Britten's Paul Bunyan. She sang Belinda in Purcell's Dido and Aeneas at the Berlin Staatsoper, Fulvia in
Handel's Ezio with the
King's Consort in the Théâtre des Champs Elysée of Paris, Atalanta in
Handel's Xerxes at the English National Opera, the Governess in
Britten's The Turn of the Screw and Lucia in
Britten's The Rape of Lucretia in the Aldeburgh Festival under
Steuart Bedford's direction, Susanna in
Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro and Zerlina in Don Giovanni for the Glyndebourne Festival and Touring Operas.
Gritton became known as a reliable recording artist early in her career. On the Tring label she sang the soprano part in Górecki's Symphony No. 3 (Symphony of Sorrowful Songs), the part of Miss Wordsworth in the Collins Classics recording under
Steuart Bedford of
Britten's Albert Herring, a set of Holst songs for the same label,
Vivaldi's Ottone in Villa on Chandos with
Hickox conducting, several Purcell discs, sacred music of
Handel and
Handel's Deborah and Occasional Oratorio with the
King's Consort on Hyperion, and, on Deutsche Grammophon,
Handel's Solomon (as the Queen of Sheba) and Messiah as well as Beethoven's little-known Vesta's Feuer. Her first solo recital disc was a collection of songs by Fanny Mendelssohn-Hensel on Hyperion, and her first operatic lead was as
Handel's Theodora with
Paul McCreesh and the
Gabrieli Consort & Players for Deutsche Grammophon's Archiv label. She also recorded the Purcell/
Britten realizations on Hyperion with
Graham Johnson.
For the 1999 - 2000 season she received a contract as a principal singer at the English National Opera. Her debuts in lead roles in that capacity were as Pamina in The Magic Flute and the title role in Janacek's The Cunning Little Vixen, as well as appearances as Drusilla in
Monteverdi's The Coronation of Poppea and Hero in
Berlioz's Beatrice et Benedict.