Next Generation Artists Showcase Perfomers​

 

Sopranos: Cassia Moore, Naela Cahir, Marianna Rodrigues
Altos: Orla Smith, Ellen Griffiths
Tenors: Desmond Halvin, Oliver Heath*
Basses: John Johnston, Fraser Robinson​​

*Guest NGA

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Biographies:

 

Cassia Moore: Cassia Moore is an eighteen-year-old soprano from County Down. She is working towards her ARSM diploma in Music Performance under the training of Charlotte O’Hare, and has taken a master-class with world-class opera singer, Danielle de Niese. Most recently Cassia has been awarded Voice 1st Prize and the Cordes Prize at the Royal Academy of Music’s New Talent Festival 2025, won 3rd place at the 2025 Northern Ireland Young Musician Competition, and performed as a finalist in the Charles Wood International Song Competition. She also sang as part of the Charles Wood Singers 2025. Cassia has accepted an offer to read Modern and Medieval Languages (German and Italian) at the University of Cambridge, after which she hopes to use these languages while pursuing Opera and Classical Singing at post-graduate level. 

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Naela Chair: Neala Cahir is a soprano and final-year Bachelor of Music student at Queen’s University Belfast, where she studies under the direction of Jenny Bourke. A member of Cappella Caeciliana since January 2024, she has performed extensively with the ensemble, including their recent tour to Paris in collaboration with Sorbonne University. Neala achieved success at the Holywood Music Festival, winning the Katie Major Cup for Classical Singing, and appeared as a featured soloist in Queen’s University’s Harty Room Recital Series in February 2025. Alongside her performance work, she teaches voice and piano at Presto Music Academy, where she enjoys fostering

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Marianna Rodrigues: Portuguese soprano Mariana Rodrigues recently completed her postgraduate studies at the Royal Academy of Music in London, with a full scholarship under Marie Vassiliou, Raymond Connell, James Baillieu, Joseph Middleton and Philip Sunderland. A soloist for Academy Song Circle, Academy Voices, Resounding Shores and Bach in Leipzig, Rodrigues has won the Isabel Jay Memorial Prize, Edna Bralesford Vocal Prize, Regency Award and Flora Nielsen Prize. Recent engagements include Sir John Clerk’s solo cantata with Dunedin Consort and Billy Cowie’s song cycle live premiere with Chantefable.

Recent festival appearances include Bachcelona, Bloomsbury, Baroquestock, Islington, and Vilalte.

Young Artist Programmes for the 2025/2026 Season include BREMF Emerging Artist with her duo Chantefable, Vache Baroque James Bowman Young Artist, Bachcelona AKADEMIE with Lluís Vilamajó and Paul Agnew, first ever Concertist Fellow with Oxford Bach Soloists and Next Generation Artist with Sestina Music.

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Orla Smith: ​Orla Frances Smith is a Zwischenfacher Soprano based in Belfast. She trained in Glasgow at the
Royal Conservatoire of Scotland on a scholarship from the RCS Trust, earning a bachelors degree. Whilst there she developed her growing love for opera and art song, studying under Professor Stephen Robertson, Lorna Anderson, and Linda Ormiston OBE. She also performed with the RCS chamber choir, with highlights including the Scottish premier of Judith Weir’s ‘Blue hills beyond blue hills’ (2019), and BBC Scotland’s ‘Christmas at The Quay’ (2023). With the Vocal Performance choir she performed in works such as Purcell’s ‘Dido and Aeneas’, Faure Requiem, and Mozart Requiem. As a soloist, her repertoire includes roles such as Marcellina and Cherubino (Mozart, Le Nozze Di Figaro), Madame De la Haultier (Massenet, Cendrillion), Charlotte (Massenet,Werther), Eboli (Verdi, Don Carlos). She also has a varied art song repertoire, including Korngold, Schumann, Schubert, Lili and Nadia Boulanger, Jake Heggie, and Tom Lehrer.

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Ellen Griffiths: Ellen is a freelance mezzo-soprano and ensemble singer from Liverpool. She completed an MA in Vocal Performance at the University of York with Susan Young, generously supported by the Dixon Scholarship, and is now a Lay Clerk at Canterbury Cathedral, where she receives lessons from Linda Hirst. Ellen is currently an Emerging Artist at St Martin-in-the-Fields and a member of the 2025 Glyndebourne Academy cohort. Recent solo highlights have included Vivaldi Gloria, Bach Magnificat, Pergolesi Stabat Mater, Mozart Requiem and Beethoven Mass in C and recitals at Canterbury and Liverpool Cathedrals. Ensemble work has included projects with St Martin’s Voices and Kantos. Ellen is a former member of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Choir and an alumna of the Genesis Sixteen programme. She has previously held scholarships at Canterbury and Liverpool Cathedrals, St Martin-in-the-Fields, St John’s Hackney, Lancaster Priory and with The Esterhazy Singers. Ellen is also a keen choral conductor and has trained with the charity Sing for Pleasure.

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Desmond Halvin:  Desmond Havlin is a tenor from Bangor, County Down. He studies singing with operatic bass Graeme Danby and is currently in the Northern Ireland Opera Chorus Development programme. Notable appearances includes playing The Miller in Phillip Glass & Robert Moran’s adaptation of ‘The Juniper Tree’ (Grand Opera House Studio, 2024), featuring as tenor soloist throughout the 2024 and 2025 Summer Recital series including a sold out Morning Melodies programme (Grand Opera House Studio). He has also appeared as a chorus member in NI Opera’s productions of ‘Tosca’ (Grand Opera House, 2023), ‘Eugene Onegin’ (Grand Opera House, 2024) and Haydn’s ‘The Last Seven Words of Christ’ (Ulster Hall, 2025) In 2025, Desmond sang the role of Uriel in Haydn’s ‘The Creation’ with Richmondshire Choral Society. He also was a part of the Charles Wood Singers and recorded a Choral Evensong for BBC Radio 3.

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Oliver Heath:  Oliver Heath is a Northern Irish conductor, composer, and singer based in Yorkshire. He currently serves as Choral Director for the Diocese of Salford and Associate Choral
Leader at St Martin-in-the-Fields, directing a wide range of ensembles from children’s and parish choirs to university chamber choirs, choral scholars, and his own vocal ensemble, Oriana, specialising in exploring 20th and 21st Century British Music. A graduate of the University of Leeds, Oliver specialised in
conducting, composition, and British music. During his studies, he held an enhanced choral scholarship at Leeds Cathedral, under Thomas Leech, regularly conducting their various cathedral choirs and working within their award-winning National Schools Singing Programme, leading whole-class singing across West Yorkshire.

Oliver has also held emerging artist positions with Chamber Choir Ireland, The Sixteen, the Royal School of Church Music, and Sing for Pleasure, reflecting his growing reputation as an imaginative and versatile choral director.

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John Johnston: John Johnston is a Belfast born baritone, based in London. He started singing as a chorister in St. Peter’s Cathedral Schola Cantorum, Belfast, and later the chapel choir of Winchester College. He graduated from the University of Oxford with a first-class degree in Music, where he was an Academical Clerk in the New College Choir. During his time at Oxford John enjoyed working on numerous vocal projects with New Chamber Opera, Schola Cantorum, and the Oxford Opera Society; highlights of which include the roles of Figaro in Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro, and Paris in John Weldon’s The Judgement of Paris. Recent masterclass opportunities have included Joyce di Donato and Jonathon Cole-Swinard. John has since held a lay clerkship with the Choir of New College, a Graduate Scholarship with Ex Cathedra, and is pursuing a postgraduate degree at the Royal college of Music, where he is taught by Russell Smythe.

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Fraser Robinson: Fraser Baritone is a baritone hailing from Hamilton Scotland , he is a recent graduate of the
Alexander Gibson Opera School at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland under the tutelage of Scott Johnson and Andrew McTaggart , he also completed his undergraduate studies at the RCS. Fraser was a member of the RCS choir for 3 years and was a part of the Chorus for their performances of Vivaldi Gloria and Faure Requiem. in 2024 , Fraser sang the roles of Petrus as well as Pontifex 1 as well as singing in the Bass chorus at the Edinburgh International Festival's performance of St Matthew Passion (1841.arr) by Bach as well as singing Pilatus and BassSoloist in Bach's St John Passion at Glasgow Cathedral.