To Saint Cecilia

Guest Artists

A passionate communicator and dynamic presence onstage, soprano Carley DeFranco brings emotional and vocal clarity to repertoire ranging from Baroque oratorio to 21st-century opera.

The 2024–25 Boston Lyric Opera Shrestinian Award Winner, Carley’s favorite projects reach beyond the assumed classical music experience. Memorable performances include Les Illuminations with Urbanity Dance and Emmanuel Music, choreographed by Shura Baryshnikov; La Mer with Boston Ballet and Lorelei Ensemble; a concert in the courtyard of the Boston Public Library with Boston Lyric Opera; the premiere of Lost Birds by Christopher Tin with VOCES8; and the roles of Anna and Dido in Dido’s Ghost with Emmanuel Music.

A longtime member of Emmanuel Music and former Lorraine Hunt Lieberson Fellow, Carley has sung more than 100 cantatas in the Sunday Bach Cantata Series. More recent concert performances include Mass in B Minor with Jos van Veldhoven and Considering Matthew Shepard with Craig Hella Johnson (Oregon Bach Festival), Knoxville: Summer of 1915 and Mahler 4 (Symphony NH), Messiah (Music Worcester), and Rossini’s Giunone (Back Bay Chorale). Carley performs frequently with Sarasa Ensemble, Musicians of the Old Post Road, Silentwoods Collective, Monadnock Music and Alea III. She is a chorister with Handel and Haydn Society, True Concord, Oregon Bach Festival and Boston Lyric Opera.

A dedicated teacher, Carley is the founder of DeFranco Music LLC and partners with local schools to offer in-school music lessons. She is an Instructor of Voice with Harvard University’s Holden Voice Program and maintains a voice studio at her home in Brookline.

Krista River, mezzo-soprano, has appeared as a soloist with the Boston Symphony, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, the North Carolina Symphony, the Cape Cod Symphony, the Santa Fe Symphony, Handel & Haydn Society, the Florida Orchestra, the Charlotte Symphony, Odyssey Opera, Baltimore Choral Arts Society, and Boston Baroque. Winner of the Concert Artists Guild International Competition and a Sullivan Foundation grant recipient, her opera roles include Dido in Dido and Aeneas, Sesto in La clemenza di Tito, Cherubino in Le nozze di Figaro, Rosina in Il barbiere di Siviglia, Zerlina in Don Giovanni, Anna in Weill’s Seven Deadly Sins, Nancy in Britten’s Albert Herring, and the title role in Handel’s Xerxes.

Krista made her Tanglewood debut in the role of Jordan Baker in John Harbison’s The Great Gatsby. Other notable performances include the International Water and Life Festival in Qinghai, China, and recitals at Jordan Hall in Boston and the Asociación Nacional de Conciertos in Panama City, Panama. For her solo recital at Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, the New York Times praised her “shimmering voice…with the virtuosity of a violinist and the expressivity of an actress.” Krista appears on numerous recordings, including Wasting the Night: Songs (music of Scott Wheeler) and Boston Modern Orchestra Project’s recording of Tobias Picker’s The Fantastic Mr. Fox, for which she won a Grammy award.

Krista began her musical career as a cellist, earning her music degree at St. Olaf College. She resides in Boston and is a regular soloist with Emmanuel Music’s renowned Bach Cantata Series.

Daniel Fridley, bass, resides in the Boston area and uses his “spotless, resonant bass” (Cleveland Classical) as a virtuosic vehicle suited to a wide range of musical styles. He performs a variety of operatic genres, specializing primarily in the music of the Baroque and Classical periods, and sings in a number of ensembles focusing on music from the Middle Ages through the 20th century.

This season, Daniel joins Upper Valley Baroque as one of the soloists for Handel’s Messiah (September), sings in the chorus of Dido’s Ghost with Emmanuel Music (October), and performs with Boston Baroque (December). He joins The Spectrum Singers as soloist and chorister (November), and makes his debut with the Old Post Road Ensemble (December) and Arcadia Players (December). In 2026, Daniel begins by making a recording of Britten’s Curlew River with Enigma Chamber Opera. He then tours with Culomba, including another workshop for Song Roots in Vancouver, BC as well as appearances around New England. He takes Telemann’s Don Quichotte to tour in Germany with the Boston Early Music Festival (March).

Daniel grew up in the Willamette Valley region of Oregon, but has gradually made his way across the country to the East Coast. His other musical interests include conducting and dance (both historical and ballroom). Outside of the musical realm, he’s an avid explorer of both board games and the wonders of the natural world. He also loves to read and to bake, and to enjoy a well brewed cup of coffee.