(ANNANDALE-on-HUDSON, N.Y.) – Acclaimed soprano and Grammy Award-winner Dawn Upshaw will be joined by actress Mary Stuart Masterson, singers of the Bard Conservatory Graduate Vocal Arts Program, pianists of the Conservatory Post Graduate Piano Fellowship Program, and The Chancellor-Livingston 5th Grade Chorus for “A Winter Songfest,” in a family-friendly program of festive songs and ensembles in the Sosnoff Theater of the Fisher Center at Bard College on Sunday, December 13, at 3pm.

Highlights of the program include Upshaw performing “Sing for Your Supper” from “The Boys from Syracuse” by Richard Rodgers. Also on the program are holiday favorites such as Irving Berlin’s “Snow,” from “White Christmas”; Frank Loesser’s “Baby, it’s Cold Outside,” and the classic “We Wish You a Merry Christmas.”

Soprano Dawn Upshaw has achieved worldwide celebrity as a singer of opera and concert repertoire ranging from the sacred works of Bach to the freshest sounds of today. She is artistic director of the Graduate Vocal Arts Program at The Bard College Conservatory of Music, and was recently appointed as head of the Vocal Arts Program?at the Tanglewood Music Center. Upshaw’s acclaimed performances on the opera stage comprise the great Mozart roles (Pamina, Ilia, Susanna, Despina) as well as modern works by Stravinsky, Poulenc, and Messiaen. From Salzburg, Paris, and Glyndebourne to the Metropolitan Opera, where she began her career in 1984 and has since made nearly 300 appearances, Upshaw has also championed numerous new works created for her including The Great Gatsby by John Harbison; the Grawemeyer Award–winning opera L’Amour de loin and the oratorio La Passion de Simone by Kaija Saariaho; John Adams’s nativity oratorio El Niño; and Osvaldo Golijov’s chamber opera Ainadamar and song cycle Ayre. A five-time Grammy Award winner, Dawn Upshaw recently received the 2014 Best Classical Vocal Solo Grammy for Maria Schneider’s Winter Morning Walks. She is featured on more than 50 recordings, including the million-selling Symphony No. 3 by Henryk Gorecki for Nonesuch Records. In 2007, she was named a Fellow of the MacArthur Foundation, and in 2008 she was named a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

The Graduate Vocal Arts Program of The Bard College Conservatory of Music is a unique master of music program in vocal performance. This two-year master of music degree balances a respect for established repertory and expressive techniques with the flexibility and curiosity needed to keep abreast of evolving musical ideas.

The Bard College Conservatory of Music is recognized as one of the finest conservatories in the United States. Founded in 2005, the Conservatory is guided by the principle that musicians should be broadly educated in the liberal arts and sciences to achieve their greatest potential. All undergraduates complete two degrees over a five-year period, a bachelor of music and a bachelor of arts in a field other than music.