About
About PREformances™️
After eleven seasons of live performances, the innovative classical concert series PREFORMANCES™ with Allison Charney pivoted to a virtual format in March of 2020, presented by the PREFORMANCES™️ Chamber Music Collaborative, whose mission is to honor Henry David Thoreau’s belief that “if we respected only what is inevitable and has a right to be, music and poetry would resound along the streets.”
During the pandemic we created a new 7-part concert and conversation series – SEASON OF HOPE – where acclaimed opera singer Allison Charney hosts a behind-the-scenes glimpse into top-level artists’ practices and performances, deliberately blurring the traditional barriers which exist between classical musicians and their audiences. Ms. Charney not only showcases each of her renowned guests’ exquisite performances but also sings on each episode. As with her in-person series, Ms. Charney promises a unique experience that provides entertainment performed at the highest level along with unique insights, providing audience members with classical music knowledge that she promises “is simply not Google-able.” In addition, we partnered with New York City’s historic TOWN HALL to present OPERA AT HOME – the first installment in our new OPERAS IN SHORT series.
PREFORMANCES™ has presented over 100 of the preeminent musicians of our time. Notable appearances include those by New York Philharmonic Music Director Alan Gilbert, Metropolitan Opera stars William Burden and Maria Zifchak, “Queen of the Flute,” Carol Wincenc, violinist Kelly Hall-Tompkins of Broadway’s “Fiddler on the Roof” fame, and concert pianists Joel Fan and Navah Perlman, just to name a few. In addition, we have presented new classical works by composers such as Michael Ching, Moshe Knoll, Mary Ellen Childs, Russell Platt and Kim D. Sherman.
PREFORMANCES™ is supported in part through the generosity of its patron group – Friends of PREFORMANCES™ – donors who believe in the series’ mission and vision. This support enables the development of new works and helps provide educational community outreach efforts, offering free tickets to aspiring young professional musicians as well as students without regular access to high-quality classical music programming.
PREFORMANCES™ embraces artists, audiences and music of all backgrounds, ethnicities, orientations and world-views. We denounce racism and bigotry of any kind and stand committed to equality, diversity, accessibility and combating injustice; anything less is unacceptable.
Allison Charney
Soprano Allison Charney’s operatic career began in earnest following the national finals of the Metropolitan Opera Competition with her debut at the New York City Opera as Musetta in La Bohème. She has gone on to sing most of Puccini’s leading soprano roles in opera companies throughout the country, including the title roles in Madama Butterfly, Tosca and Suor Angelica, Mimi in La Bohème and Liù in Turandot, earning a reputation for her “vocal agility, lush sound and dramatic portrayals” of the lirico-spinto roles in her wide-ranging repertoire. Ms. Charney has experienced enormous success with her Mozart interpretations as well, including both Susanna and the Countess in Le Nozze di Figaro, both Donna Anna and Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni, Pamina in Die Zauberflöte and Sandrina in the rarely heard La Finta Giardiniera. She wowed both audience and critics all over the United States with her tour-de-force portrayals of all three heroines in Offenbach’s Tales of Hoffmann. Her versatility has also led her to sing roles as varied as Rosalinde in Die Fledermaus, Micaëla in Carmen, Nedda in Pagliacci, Santuzza in Cavalleria Rusticana and the title roles in Martha, La Traviata, Jenufa and The Merry Widow.
Ms. Charney’s career has brought her to opera companies across the United States, including the:
- New York City Opera
- Atlanta Opera
- Florida Grand Opera
- Utah Opera
- Nashville Opera
- Opera Memphis
- Annapolis Opera
- Opera Theater of Connecticut
- Mississippi Opera
- Opera Illinois
- OperaDelaware
- Utah Festival Opera
- DiCapo OperaTheater
- Tampa Opera
- Opera Idaho
- Syracuse Opera
- Washington Summer Opera Festival
- Colorado Opera Festival
Concert highlights have included performances at Alice Tully Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, as a featured soloist with the esteemed Philadelphia Orchestra and with the Boston Pops under the baton of Alan Gilbert. Continuing her commitment to performing music of our times, Ms. Charney recently premiered Moshe Knoll’s Psalm 133 with the San Jose Chamber Orchestra under the baton of Barbara Day Turner, in a concert that also featured Kim D. Sherman’s oratorio (composed for Ms. Charney) Songbird and the Eagle. Upcoming performances will include further premieres of pieces by Michael Ching, Ms. Sherman and Mr. Knoll, whose Psalm 133 she recently sang in concert at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center, where she was also the soprano soloist in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. Ms. Charney made her Carnegie Hall debut in the spring of 2022 as a featured soloist in the new composite song cycle, Forgotten Voices.
Ms. Charney is featured in the first recording of the Pulitzer Prize nominated oratorio Choose Life, by composer Mona Lyn Reese and can be heard in a CD of American songs with pianist, Benjamin Loeb, on the DSC Label. Ms. Charney is excited to appear on the upcoming AVIE Records recording of Forgotten Voices as well as the newly-released Navona Records ARK Resounding – the debut recording of the ARK trio, of which she is a founding member. She is also a co-creator of the series, Her/Music; Her/Story, which was launched at Steinway Hall in 2019 and is currently showcased in a four-part radio series on WQXR. Ms. Charney is an active recitalist and master teacher and is the artistic and executive director of the long-running concert series, PREFORMANCES™️ WITH ALLISON CHARNEY most recently presented in-person at Merkin Hall in New York City. During the pandemic, Charney pivoted to the virtual stage where her concert and conversation series: SEASON OF HOPE launched the centennial year of New York City’s historic Town Hall who then presented her OPERA AT HOME adaptation of Verdi’s Otello – the first installment in her OPERAS IN SHORT series. After receiving her Bachelor of Arts degree, magna cum laude with highest honors, in Special Concentrations from Harvard University, she went on to earn two graduate degrees in music from the Peabody Conservatory of Johns Hopkins University. Ms. Charney now lives in New York with her husband and their two sons.
Board of Directors

Allison Charney

Lisa Charney

Nancy Friedman

Benjamin Loeb

Jillian Neubauer
Our Eleventh Season Team
Allison Charney
Artistic and Executive Director
Craig Ketter
Collaborative Pianist
Doug Fitch
Original Art Work
Front Porch Solutions
Graphic Design/Marketing
Jeffrey Blum
Accounting
Dechert, LLP
Legal
David Andrako
Photography
THE LATEST NEWS
Stay up-to-date on the latest and greatest news about PREFORMANCES.
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Allison Charney Appears on Music Matters 2020 with Jason Tramm
July 20, 2020
Soprano and PREformances founder Allison Charney joined Music Matters 2020 with Jason…
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Veteran Actor Of Screen And Stage – Jordan Charney – Will Appear At PREformances At Merkin Hall
February 13, 2020
This article was written by BWW News Desk and originally appeared on…
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