Biography
Learn more about Denis Vélez
The Third Coast Review has praised Soprano Denis Vélez ´ “otherworldly” voice, and her
“breakout performance” with “the poise and confidence to match her silky soprano” in her 2025 Chicago Opera debut in Salieri´s Falstaff.
This 2026 Denis Vélez her rol and company debut as -Juliette in Gounod´s Roméo et Juliette with Opera Maine.
Her 2024-2025 season included performances with the Orquesta Filarmónica de Chihuahua, the Orquesta Sinfónica de Mineria, the Orquesta Camerata Metropolitana and she was featured with the Joffrey Ballet as the singer soloist in the ballet Broken Wings by Annabelle Ochoa.
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She made her mainstage debut with Opera de Bellas Artes as Rosalba from Florencia en el
Amazonas under the baton of Ivan Lopez Reynoso and Enrique Singer as Stage Director. Denis sang Zerlina in Don Giovanni at Wolftrap Opera, covered La Catrina in El Último sueño de Frida y Diego at the premier of San Francisco Opera with Roberto Kalb conducting and Lorena Mazda as Stage Director and Papagena in The Magic Flute at Des Moines Opera.
While at the Lyric Opera of Chicago´s prestigious Ryan Opera Center, she sang Frasquita (covering Micaela) in Carmen with Henrik Nánási conducting and the stage director Marie Lambert-Le Bihan, Sandmad and Dew Fary (covering Gretel) at Hänsel und Gretel with Sr.
Andrew Davis conducting and the stage director Eric Einhorn, the pants role of Thibault in Don
Carlos, Alice (Covered) at Le Comte Ory, Papagena (covering)First Lady in The Magic Flute with conductor Karen Kamensek at the marvelous Kosky´s production directed by Tobias Ribitzki,
Rosalba (Covered) in Florencia en el Amazonas and Gianetta in L´elisir d´amore with Enrique
Mazola conducting and Daniel Slater as Stage Director. She was invited on 2 different occasions to take part in the magnificent Beyond the Aria concert series produced by the Harris Theater in association with Lyric Opera of Chicago.During COVID´s hold on the industry, she also sang on a number of the Lyric Opera of Chicago´s programs, including Pasión Latina, The Next Chapter: Creating the Factotum, Sole e Amore in which she sang songs from Verdi and Puccini, Magical Around the World, and the company´s annual Rising Stars in Concert in which she sang excerpts of L´amico Fritz.
Soprano Vélez is a Classical Voice Fellow of the LuminArts Foundation. She made history by
becoming the first Méxican opera singer to win The Metropolitan´s Laffont Competition in
New York; and She earned First Prize Winner, Special Price of the French Repertoire and Special Price Francisco Araiza at Carlo Morelli competition in México.
