Soprano
Lovely Soprano
-Quad City Times
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Well-defined characterizations
-Saginaw News
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Crowd Pleasing
-Midland Daily News
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Excellent Acting & Singing
-City Arts Online
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Expertly Sung
-Seattle Times
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Seattle Gay News had this to say about her performance in Purcell's Dido and Aeneas with Pacific MusicWorks and GRAMMY award winning conductor, Stephen Stubbs:
"Soprano Holly Boaz sang the pivotal role of Belinda, Dido's lady in waiting, with a lilting soprano and a vivid stage presence that urged the shy prince to 'pursue thy conquest love.'
When it came time to switch sides in the second scene and become a witch, Boaz cackled gleefully over Dido's fate with equal commitment and effectiveness."
Holly enjoys a varied career in opera, oratorio, chamber and choral music. ​Career highlights include solo debuts with the Seattle Symphony in Mozart’s Requiem and with Tacoma Opera as Eurydice in Offenbach’s Orpheus in the Underworld, a solo recital for the 60th Aldeburgh Festival in England, her Canadian debut with the Vancouver Early Music Festival in Handel's Israel and Egypt, and a tour of Cambridgeshire and Canterbury with Caritas Chamber Choir in the UK. ​​
She has performed solo recitals with the Aldeburgh Festival in England, The Russian Chamber Music Foundation of Seattle, Vashon Chamber Music, PLU Artist Series, Saugerties Pro Musica in New York State, and on tour throughout Eastern Washington as a winner of the Ladies Musical Club of Seattle Competition.
​Of her over 30 operatic roles, favorites include Donna Anna and Donna Elvira (Don Giovanni), Mimì and Musetta (La Bohème), Susanna, the Countess, and Marcellina (Le nozze di Figaro), The Governess (Turn of the Screw), Female Chorus (The Rape of Lucretia), and Micaëla (Carmen). She has appeared on the stages of Seattle Opera, Connecticut Opera, Tacoma Opera, Hudson Opera Theatre, Aspen Music Festival, Quad Cities Opera, The Seattle, Tacoma, Adrian, Midland, and Hartford Symphonies, Northwest Sinfonietta, Taconic Opera, and Center City Opera in Philadelphia.
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Holly trained at Music Academy of the West, The Aspen Music Festival and School, the Seattle Opera Young Artists Program, The Britten-Pears Programme, the Baroque Performance Institute at Oberlin College, the Cleveland Art Song Festival, and the Seattle Academy of Baroque Opera. She holds degrees from the Hartt School at the University of Hartford and the University of Wisconsin - Madison.
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She has been privileged to learn from such illustrious mentors as Vinson Cole, Jane Eaglen, Peter Kazaras, Carol Vaness, Marilyn Horne, Mark Oswald, and Nancy Zylstra.