After six seasons at The Metropolitan Opera, numerous engagements on the stage of Carnegie Hall, touring the world with Leonard Bernstein, and thousands of performances as a solo artist, contralto Gwenneth Bean decided to come back home to Michigan, near her family and friends, where she now resides.and she will be performing on the Dogwood Center’s Main Stage on March 20! 
Ms. Bean’s program at the Dogwood Center will include classical pieces from Copland, Schubert and Handel to more contemporary pieces from Gershwin, Bernstein, and Rogers and Hammerstein.
Michigan born contralto, Gwenneth Bean, is a graduate of Mona Shores High School. Her 17 year career has taken her to opera stages and concert halls throughout the United States, Canada, Europe and Japan. She has sung numerous roles with the New York Metropolitan Opera, Chicago Lyric Opera, and opera houses in Dallas, Miami, Santa Fe, Toronto, San Francisco, Washington DC, Boston, Philadelphia, Vienna, Rome, Paris, London, and more.
Bean toured Japan with the Metropolitan Opera, and toured Europe and the United States with the late Maestro Leonard Bernstein. She has worked with conductors Zubin Mehta, Leonard Slatkin, Seji Ozawa, Andrew Davis, Hugh Wolf, James Levine, Charles Dutoit, and of course the late Bernstein, to name a few.
Gwenneth Bean has shared the stage with Luciano Pavarotti, Placido Domingo, Renee Fleming, Sherill Milnes, Sam Ramey, Jerry Hadley, Jessye Norman, and many others.
Locally, she has performed with Opera Grand Rapids in Faust, Romeo and Juliet, and The Flying Dutchman and was the alto soloist for Handel’s Messiah at DeVos Hall. Ms. Bean sang Mahler’s Eighth with the Grand Rapids Symphony and was featured in Night of the Opera with the Holland Symphony.
Ms. Bean resides in Grand Rapids, teaching private voice and is the Director of Music and Worship at Spring Lake Christian Reformed Church. She sings as much as possible including the national anthem at many sporting events. She is often seen performing benefits for the charities and issues she supports.
Tickets $15. Main stage. 7:30 p.m.
http://photos.mlive.com/grandrapidspress/2010/02/gwenneth_bean_profile_1.html
Wikipedia trivia: A contralto voice is a type of classical female singing voice with a vocal range between a tenor and a mezzo-soprano; it is the deepest female singing voice.