An Arcata Singer Hits the Big Time
Building on the many wonderful musical opportunities in Humboldt County, some musicians raised here have moved away for other opportunities.
Allison Hai-Ting Chinn is one of them. She first sang in public with the Humboldt Light Opera Company and the Redwood Coast Children’s Chorus. After graduating from Arcata High, she went on the Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester and then the Yale opera program.
Now Chinn, a mezzo-soprano, lives in New York, where she has performed with the New York City Opera, the American Symphony Orchestra and many others, and at Carnegie Hall, and sings around the world.
Two of her loves are music and science, and she has been involved with several projects using music as a medium to teach about science, including her “Science Fair: An Opera with Experiments,” a stage show of science set to music, and with Trio Triumphatrix, “Astronautica: Voices of Women in Space,” a concert of songs with video accompaniment based on the words of women astronauts.
Her most recent creation is an opera called “Meltdown” about being a female glaciologist in a male-dominated field amidst climate change.
On a lighter note, she once appeared on “The Wendy Williams Show” singing the ingredient list to a Twinkie.
For more information about all these projects, check out her website, hai-ting.com/.
Phyllis Chinn, a former longtime Humboldter, now lives in New York City to be closer to Allison and her brother Wesley, also a musician and conductor.
