Susan McBerry

Coordinator of Vocal Studies, Instructor of Voice, Director of Opera and Music Theatre Workshops

Evans Center 11

Soprano Susan McBerry, lyric soprano and teacher of voice, has been the coordinator of vocal studies at Lewis & Clark College since 1987. She teaches Art and Science of the Voice and Vocal Literature in addition to private voice lessons. She also directs the Opera Workshop and Musical Theater Workshop.

Ms. McBerry is an experienced and popular recitalist whose specialty is French art song of the 19th and 20th Centuries, which she studied extensively with Pierre Bernac, the famous French baritone. Other coaches include Gerard Souzay, Elly Ameling, Dalton Baldwin. She has performed recitals, lecture-recitals, and sacred concerts throughout the United States and Canada and is in demand as a clinician and adjudicator for music conferences and contests sponsored by Music Educators National Conference, American Choral Directors Association and National Association of Teachers of Singing of which she is former Northwest Regional Governor and national board member. (Some of you may also have seen her perform as the infamous diva in the comic vocal recital, The BoZoArtZ Duo.)

As a vocal coach and conductor, McBerry has provided vocal and music direction for plays and musicals at Lewis and Clark, student compositions, operas and opera scenes.   In her tenure at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Portland where she is now Director of Music Emerita, she produced and directed sacred opera and oratorio for twenty years.

She is available as a consultant to Oregon Health Science University Voice Clinic for rehabilitation of singers with vocal problems. Ms. McBerry also maintains a private studio where her students include many award-winning professionals from classical singers to jazz and musical theater performers. 

Academic Credentials

MA 1971, BA 1970 Portland State University