Department of Music

Pamela Blevins Beasley, soprano, has sung many leading and supporting operatic and musical theater roles with Fort Worth Opera, Birmingham Civic Opera, Pensacola Opera, Mobile Opera, Southern Regional Opera, Maxwell Theater Troupe, Southwestern Opera Theater and University of Montevallo Lyric Theater. Highlight roles include: Mimi La Boheme, Zerlina Don Giovanni, Mother Amahl and the Night Visitors,  Marian The Music Man, both Julie and Carrie in performances of Carousel, Yum-Yum The Mikado, Jenny Down in the Valley, and Mary Little Mary Sunshine.   She has appeared as featured soprano soloist at Carnegie Hall and as a recitalist in Rome, Italy.  Her performance experience has also included an active oratorio and sacred concert engagement schedule in Virginia, Alabama, Mississippi, Texas and New York. Oratorio repertoire performed includes: Messiah – Handel; Gloria – Vivaldi and Poulenc; Magnificat – J. S. Bach and Rutter; Requiem – Faure, Rutter and Mozart; Mass in C – Mozart and Beethoven; Missa Brevis – Haydn; Britten’s Festival te Deum, Rejoice in the Lamb and Ceremony of Carols; and Mendelssohn’s Elijah, St. Paul and Hymn of Praise. She has appeared locally with the Virginia Consort, the Oratorio Society, the Charlottesville Symphony, the University of Virginia Chamber Music Series, and with the Crozet Community Orchestra.   She has also been an active recitalist in various venues including the universities where she has taught and locally with the Wednesday Music Club and Charlottesville Music Teachers Association.  

Teaching has been an integral part of Pamela’s musical career.  Her students have been winners at State and Regional National Association of Teachers of Singing events and have competed at the National level NATS auditions. Her students have also included winners at district Metropolitan Opera auditions.  Many have pursued graduate performance degrees at some of the finest music schools in the country and are now performing professionally in the U.S., including the Metropolitan Opera and on international stages.  She has served on the faculties James Madison University School of Music; Mary Baldwin University Department of Fine Arts; Liberty University School of Music; University of Mobile School of Music; University of South Alabama Department of Music; and Auburn University at Montgomery Department of Music. She has also served on the faculty of Operafestival di Roma, Rome, Italy. In addition to applied voice, she has taught solo vocal literature, vocal pedagogy, vocal diction, and has directed opera workshops and choral ensembles. Pamela has taught at UVA since 2004 as a member of the Performance Faculty.  She currently serves as the Vocal Coordinator, teaches private applied voice, voice class, and co-directs the ensemble, Voice for the Stage.

Professional activities include a long-term membership in the NATS organization, having served as both Governor for the Alabama Chapter and as a Board Member for the Virginia Chapter.  She is also in frequent demand leading Vocal Master Classes and as an adjudicator/clinician for both vocal and choral competitions, workshops and festivals. Pamela has facilitated statewide and university level Master Classes (and had her students perform) with notable vocal clinicians and coaches including Gayleatha Nichols, Dalton Baldwin, Roberta Alexander, Arlene Shrut, Renee Fleming, and Martin Katz. 

Beasley holds degrees from Southwestern Seminary and the University of Montevallo where she was a member of Phi Kappa Phi and Pi Kappa Lambda honorary societies. Additional studies were completed at Boston Conservatory and Shenandoah Conservatory.  She studied voice with Benjamin Middaugh, Lynda Poston-Smith, and has appeared in Master Classes with Bruce Lunkley, Walter Foster, Helmuth Rilling among others. She has studied vocal pedagogy with James McKinney, Robert Burton, Jeanette Lovetri and Rebecca Folsom.   She has received numerous awards and was selected for Outstanding Women of America, 1981, and Who’s Who in America, 2007.