By Betty Cui, courtesy of Kent News
This year, a record number of vocal students have been selected into Regionals, All-State and even the All-Eastern chorus organized by Connecticut Music Educators Association. Behind this big success is one person who cannot be forgotten— Ms. Johanna Albrecht, the Kent voice instructor. Having taught singing at Kent for over two decades, Ms. Albrecht has nurtured the voices of generations of students passionate about vocal art and has made the vocal program at Kent what it is today.
Growing up in a music-oriented family in Massachusetts, Ms. Albrecht became interested in music at a young age. She took her first piano lesson at age seven, and, encouraged by her grandmother, began singing at fourteen. Throughout her teenage years, she began to explore music more in-depth and headed off to Smith College intent on majoring in music.
After graduating from Smith, she went on to join a dancing group in New York where she also had a singing role. Soon after, she married and followed her new husband back to Germany. As she adjusted to the new environment, she began to study voice at the Leopold Mozart Konservatorium in Augsburg, Germany. There, she performed many classical German operas and operettas. Though her singing career in Germany was relatively successful, she moved back to the United States to obtain a Master’s degree in both music and theatre from Smith.
After completing her degrees, Ms. Albrecht started her singing career in New York. She sang solos at the Kennedy Center, Emmanuel Church, Weill Recital Hall, Town Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, and the New York State Theatre. She performed as a singer-actress in off-Broadway musical theatre productions and in the role of Mother Abbess in six U.S. productions of The Sound of Music.
Ms. Albrecht’s teaching at Kent started by coincidence. Her friend, Jon Lefleur, invited her to be a soprano for a chorus that he directed in the town of Kent. Upon hearing her performances, she received an offer from Mr. and Mrs. Holcombe, teachers at Kent, to fill the role of voice teacher. And since that day, Ms. Albrecht has fulfilled that role.
Ms. Albrecht has helped to lead the development of the music programs at Kent. Though the music program here is thriving, it was not always so. She recalls that when she arrived, she had only had two students. Though there was a choir, there was no chamber choir, Kentettes, concert band, or jazz band. Reflecting on the days when the campus was split between boys and girls, requiring much travel on her part, Ms. Albrecht says, “It is so nice that everyone is on the same campus now and we have wonderful music rooms.”
Ms. Albrecht has loved teaching at Kent and is proud to have helped produce some of the nation’s best talent, including rising opera star Joseph Kaiser, who has performed solo with the New York Metropolitan Opera. She describes her teaching strategy as, “using [her] own performing experience in order to help students perform as well as they can.” She teaches students “how to deal with performing nerves and breathing, for instance. Knowing what you are going to perform, knowing what you are going to sing. And to know it 100 percent.” Though she admits Kent life can be busy and hectic, she is glad that each of her students has an opportunity to perform a vocal piece or two for the community in May.
Ms. Albrecht is looking forward to working on the musical, Guys and Dolls, this year and the voice recital in May. Both of them, she says, will be excellent shows. And for the future, she only sees positive things to come for the music department. “It should keep growing in the way it has because it has been doing some wonderful things. We have some excellent teachers. The fact that there have been so many students in Regional, All-State, even All Eastern, proved that there are many talented students willing to work in music.” All of these accomplishments, at least in part, can be credited to Ms. Albrecht’s hard work and dedication to Kent music. Her excellence as an instructor has led to generations of successful students at Kent and will remain that way for years to come.
