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Amy J Payne

Described by Bachtrack in 2023 as "one of the best comprimarios on the circuit", Amy has worked with companies across the UK including Opera North, Scottish Opera, Garsington Opera, Mid Wales Opera, Buxton Festival, Iford Arts, D’Oyly Carte Opera Company, The National Gilbert & Sullivan Opera Company and Northern Opera Group.

Season highlights in 23/24 included: Arnalta The Coronation of Poppea, Mother Goose/Baba the Turk (cover) The Rake's Progress, Naval Captain Manon Lescaut for ETO; Katisha The Mikado for Charles Court Opera; Dame Carruthers The Yeomen of the Guard for Opera Holland Park.

Originally from South Devon, Amy trained at The Guildhall School of Music & Drama where she was awarded the English Song Prize. She is also a Samling Scholar and holds a BA (Hons) in French & German from King’s College, London, where she was a choral scholar.

Alongside composer and performer Anna Pool, Amy recently curated a cabaret of music by female songwriters, Frau, that’s what I call music!, which was programmed by Spitalfields Festival and Leeds Lit Fest in 2024.

Amy is an experienced actor who has an established reputation in musical theatre and operetta. In 2023, she appeared as an actor and a singer with The Sunday Boys at The Lowry in Salford in We'll Be Here Tomorrow, an evening highlighting the experiences of those living with HIV and AIDS. She performed and wrote material for Ms Midlife at The Bishopsgate Institute, devised by Catrine Kirkman and directed by Mojisola Kareem-Elufowoju and made her debut in London's West End in the Offie-winning (Best Panto Production) The Odyssey: A Heroic Pantomime at Jermyn Street Theatre.

After making her directorial debut as part of the ETO Perform programme in 2024, Amy is delighted to be assisting Victoria Briggs directing The Vanishing Forest for ETO in Spring 2025.