Soprano, MaKayla McDonald (she/her), is an active performer of new works, ensemble pieces, and opera. This season, she joined the Tanglewood Recital Series with The Boston Camerata for Free America! Early Songs of Resistance and Rebellion. Other season highlights include On Our Toes In The Hamptons: Building Our Heaven, with the Coalition for African Americans in the Performing Arts, for “…an interdisciplinary performance exploring the spiritual and artistic evolution of Black classical music,” and a residency with American Opera Projects for the NYU/Tisch Opera Lab.

Last season MaKayla joined Tero Saarinen Company and Boston Camerata on international stages for Borrowed Light, a work that captures the ritualistic essence of dance and the profound strength of community. She also collaborated with City Lyric Opera for Jeremy Beck’s, Black Water, a monodrama for soprano, with dance.

Earlier engagements include the Lift Ev’ry Voice artist residency with Cedar Rapids Opera, a residency designed to uplift community youth through music; continued faculty recitals at the Borough of Manhattan Community College; the premiere of Fizz & Ginger, a jazz opera, by Whitney George and Bea Goodwin; keynote speaker for the Cedar Valley Arts Summit.

As a lyric soprano, MaKayla has found success as an Encouragement Award Winner in the prestigious Metropolitan Opera Eric and Dominique Laffont Competition and as a Semi-Finalist in the Orpheus Vocal Competition. MaKayla was in the 2020-2021 Opera in the 21st Century cohort with Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity; a performance-based, collaborative training experience for emerging opera professionals that challenges the conventions of opera performance, production, and design.

A native Iowan, MaKayla received both her Master’s and Bachelor’s degrees in Vocal Performance, from the University of Northern Iowa. Currently, she studies with Michael Chioldi.

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MaKayla currently resides in Brooklyn, NY and is an Adjunct Lecturer for the Borough of Manhattan Community College Music and Art Department (BMCC-CUNY).  Offstage, you can usually find MaKayla at trivia night confidently answering all the pop culture questions, reading a book, or enjoying the foods of New York City.