Lesley-Anne Sammons has worked as a répetiteur with all the major British Opera Houses including Scottish Opera, Opera North, English National Opera and both Glyndebourne Festival and Touring Operas.
Her international career has taken her all over the world including three seasons for Il Teatro Massimo di Palermo. She worked on the premiére of Stravinsky’s Bible Pieces for the Nederlandse Opera, Amsterdam directed by Peter Sellars and she returned for Salome conducted by Edo de Waart.
Lesley-Anne was the Coach in Residence for L’Opera du Rhin, the Opera Studio in Strasbourg, and Circolo Portunese de Opera in Portugal for productions of Don Pasquale and Norma. She returned to Portugal for L’Elisir D’Amore at the Teatro da Trinidad in Lisbon.
She was the Chief coach for a production of L’Italiana in Algieri at the Festival del Azahar in Spain, which has recently been issued on CD.
In 1998 Lesley-Anne made her conducting debut with Opera Box with productions of La Traviata , Madama Butterfly, Gianni Schicchi, The Pearl Fishers and Dido & Aeneas.
In 2000 Lesley-Anne conducted two performances of Madama Butterfly for Opera Holland Park and on the strength of her success, was invited back the following season to conduct the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra for eleven performances of Il Barbiera di Siviglia. In recent years, following her work on I Capuleti e Montecchi for Grange Park Opera, Lesley-Anne returned for their production of La Traviata and conducted their touring company, Pimlico Opera in it’s 2002 UK tour. She also re-visited Porto for Tosca and Le Nozze di Figaro.
In 2003, Lesley Anne was invited to the Latvian National Opera to be the Language Coach for The Turn of the Screw. She was also répetiteur for The Love Potion for Pegasus Opera, Les Troyens for Nederlandse Opera and she returned to Grange Park for Iolanthe. Lesley took part in ‚ Nitro at the Opera, featuring new works by black composers including Errolyn Wallen.
Lesley-Anne conducted Hansel and Gretel for Opera Femina at both Grassington and Buxton Festivals and Edgar, Don Giovanni and La Boheme for Floral Opera and took Opera Masterclasses on a variety of repertoire.
More recently, she returned to the Linbury Studio for a revival of Nitro at the Opera, and another production by Errolyn Wallen of Another America/Fire at the Sadlers Wells Theatre. She worked for ENO on Alcina and Lulu and returned to the Nederlands Opera for Don Carlos, conducted by Riccardo Chailly and was Assistant Conductor for their production of Norma. in 2008 Lesley-Anne has been invited by Nederlands Opera to work on a new production of Bellini’s I Puritani.
Lesley Anne regularly coaches young singers at the Jette Parker Young artists Programme at Covent Garden, The RCM, The RAM and the National Opera Studio. She is a regular coach at the Advanced Opera Course at Dartington International Summer School.
In 2008, Liverpool is the European City of Culture and as part of the celebrations, Lesley-Anne has been invited to prepare the cream of young European singers for a rare production of Donizetti’s Emilia di Liverpool.
Meanwhile, she indulges her love of concert performance with Cameo Opera throughout the south of England and received top billing on P&O cruises with Soprano Jane Webster. She also played piano for a production of The Young Visitors by Daisy Ashford‚ in The Paddock Theatre production in the Lewis Festival.
Lesley Anne also featured on the popular Channel 4 programme Operatunity!