A few among many are several recent solo appearances with the National Symphony at the Kennedy Center, a performance on the Project America series at the 92nd Street Y in New York, a broadcast on NPR's Performance Today with the American Bach Soloists, plus recitals at the Phillips Collection and Corcoran Gallery.

Ms. Balestrieri has sung under the baton of Neville Marriner, Christopher Hogwood, Peter Phillips, and Leonard Slatkin, and her current season includes several return engagements in New York, including the popular Messiah performances at St.Thomas Church Fifth Avenue with Concert Royal, and appearances with the Four Nations Ensemble and Ars Antiqua. She will perform in Handel's Joshua for the 1998 Maryland Handel Festival, and will appear with the Jacksonville Symphony, Washington Bach Consort, Folger Consort, Violins of Lafayette, and ArcoVoce. Ms. Balestrieri has recorded with the American Bach Soloists for the Koch label, and with Ensemble Five/One and the Folger Consort.

In 1997, she was soprano soloist with the National Symphony Orchestra (NSO) and Christopher Hogwood in a performance of Mozart's Davide Penitente. In recital, Ms. Balestrieri performed with ArcoVoce at the Phillips Collection and the Boston Early Music Festival. She was soprano soloist in Vaughan Williams' Serenade to Music with the NSO and Leonard Slatkin at the reopening of the Kennedy Center Concert Hall in October 1997, and performed Schubert's Shepherd on the Rock on the NSO Chamber Music Series. In February 1998, she gave a solo recital on the Phillips Collection. Also in 1998, she rejoined maestro Hogwood with the Washington Bach Consort, and sang with renowned French tenor Jean-Paul Fouchécourt and the Violins of Lafayette.

Ms. Balestrieri made her New York debut with Concert Royal, and performed a program of Purcell at the Lincoln Center. Ms. Balestrieri has appeared many times with the American Bach Soloists, notably in a performance of Couperin's Leçons de Ténèbres with soprano Judith Nelson, and is a frequent guest with the Folger Consort.

Amanda Balestrieri was born and educated in England and is a diplomate of the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music in voice, piano (Lloyd Hartley Memorial Prize), and violin. She won an Open Scholarship and the William Ackroyd Foundation Scholarship to Jesus College, Oxford University, where she received her BA/MA in Modern Languages (German and French). Ms. Balestrieri studied privately with Marjorie Thomas of the Royal Academy of Music in London and with Maria Luisa Cioni in Milan, Italy.