The Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame is proud to induct Ms. Leona Mitchell into the Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame. Leona Mitchell has shared her talent with the world, performing in opera houses from Sydney to Paris to San Francisco. Leona was born in Enid in October 1948, the 10th of 15 children. She received early vocal training in the choir at the Antioch Baptist Church in Enid, where her father, Rev. Hulon Mitchell, was minister.
Following high school graduation, she received a scholarship to study music at Oklahoma City University, where she obtained her bachelors degree in music in 1971. In 1972, she won the prestigious Kurt Herbert Adler Award of the San Francisco Opera, and in 1973 received the $10,000 Opera America grant to study with Ernest St. John Metz in Los Angeles.
As a soprano, she debuted with the San Francisco Opera in 1973 as Micaela in Bizet’s Carmen. Her Metropolitan Opera Company debut in 1975 was the same role. Additional roles include Pamina in Mozart’s Die Zauberflote, Musetta in Puccini’s LaBoheme, Leonora in Verdi’s II Trovature.
Mitchell achieved international recognition when she was selected to sing Bess
in the London Records complete recording of the George Gershwin classic, Porgy and Bess, with the Cleveland Orchestra. In addition to the Metropolitan and
San Francisco Opera Companies, she has performed with the Geneva Opera, Paris Opera, New Israeli Opera, and Australia during her successful career.
Her most recent roles were Elisabetta in Verdi’s Don Carlo at Teatro Colon in Buenos Aires, Argentina; title role in Aida at Teatro Real in Madrid, Spain; Turandot in Puccini’s Tarandot at Sydney Opera House in Sydney, Australia; and Opera Australia at the Victorian Arts Center in Melbourne, Australia. In 1985, Mitchell was honored in a joint session of the Oklahoma legislature where she was recognized for her achievements and named honorary chair of Black Heritage Month. Currently residing in Houston, Mitchell recently performed in her hometown of Enid as a fundraiser for the Martin Luther King, Jr. scholarship program.