Mezzo-soprano Elisa Sutherland gives detailed, stylistic performances of early and new music with “soul-infused expressiveness and unselfconscious joie de vivre” (New York Music Daily).
Ellie is a core member of Ekmeles, a sextet dedicated to exploring microtonal tuning and extended vocal techniques, as well as Alkemie, an ensemble made up of medieval specialists that celebrates the vibrant and timeless sounds of the past and present. She is a member of the Choir of Trinity Wall Street, and frequently appears with TENET Vocal Artists, with which she has performed everything from Dowland lute songs to semi-staged pastiches of her own devising. Elisa's 2026-27 Season includes an astonishing range of high-level music-making with collaborators around the country in all genres including Brooklyn Art Song Society (BASS), Quince, The Crossing, Lorelei, Ampersand, Variant 6, and Blue Heron.
Through her work as a soloist and choral musician, Ellie has workshopped and premiered new compositions by composers Ted Hearne, Julia Wolfe, Erin Gee, Michael Gordon, Christopher Trapani, David Lang, Zosha Di Castri, Shawn Jaeger, John Luther Adams, Hannah Kendall, Caroline Shaw, Yaz Lancaster, Michael Gilbertson, Gavin Bryars, Joanne Metcalf, Kile Smith, Pablo Chin, L J White, and many more. In the world of early music, Ellie has explored repertoire ranging from the medieval to the baroque periods with ensembles ACRONYM, Quicksilver Baroque, Parthenia Viol Consort, Piffaro, Filament, Seraphic Fire, and Elm City Consort.
Ellie has been featured as a soloist with Apollo’s Fire, Baroque Music Montana, Brooklyn Art Song Society, Lyricfest, Contemporaneous, Arcana New Music Ensemble, American Bach Soloists, and Apollo Chorus of Chicago. She has sung for over 40 commercial recordings (including four GRAMMY-winning and twelve nominated albums) and was a soloist on The Crossing’s GRAMMY-nominated album, “Poor Hymnal.”
In addition to winning the Philadelphia District of the Metropolitan Opera Auditions in 2015, Ellie is the 2014 winner of the Lynne Harvey Cooper Award and was the first-place winner of the inaugural Handel Aria Competition at the Madison Early Music Festival in 2013. Ellie also was a Finalist in the 2024 Lyndon Woodside Oratorio-Solo Competition. Recent opera roles include Conversation in Marc-Antoine Charpentier’s Les plaisirs de Versailles, Hera in Chris Cerrone’s All Wounds Bleed, Ensemble in Michael Gordon’s Acquanetta with the Prototype Festival, Dido in Dido and Aeneas, Dorabella in Cosi fan tutte, Meg in Little Women, Ottavia in L'incoronazione di Poppea, and Nancy in Albert Herring. Ellie is also remembered for her Blazing Saddles/Madeline Kahn impression in a production of Die Fledermaus.
Ellie gives back to her community by being on the Boards and Advisory Boards of various music ensembles, assisting with grant writing and general admin, and frequently serves on grant panels. She has produced three full-length albums with Charles Mueller (Tiny Panther Recording) for Alkemie and Freelance Nun. Outside of music, Ellie spends her time learning to dance, writing, taking moody photographs, and investing in deep friendships.
Ellie graduated from Northwestern University with a Bachelor of Arts in Creative Writing, a Bachelor of Music in Vocal Performance, and a Master of Music in Vocal Performance. Born in Milwaukee, WI, she now lives in Brooklyn with her cat, Anton.
Ellie has performed in over 40 commercial recordings, including:
With The Crossing: Rigwreck (2026), The Sense of Senses (2025), Farming; soloist (2025), At Which Point (2025); Poor Hymnal; solist (2024), GRAMMY-winning Ochre (2024), Sumptuous Planet (2023), GRAMMY-nominated Carols After a Plague (2022), GRAMMY-winning Born (2022), GRAMMY-nominated Sila, Breath of the World (2022), A Native Hill (2021), The Tower and the Garden (2021), Rising with The Crossing (2020), GRAMMY-nominated Carthage (2020), Anonymous Man (2020), GRAMMY-nominated Voyages (2019), GRAMMY-nominated The Arc in the Sky (2019), Fire in my mouth (2019), GRAMMY-winning Zealot Canticles (2018), If There Were Water (2018), Canticles of the Holy Wind (2017), Seven Responses (2017), Sound from the Bench (2017), GRAMMY-nominated Bonhoeffer; mezzo-soprano soloist (2016), GRAMMY-winning The Fifth Century (2016), Words Adorned (2015), Moonstrung Air (2015)
With Ekmeles: Nonsongs (2026), We live the opposite daring (2024), A Howl, That Was Also A Prayer (2020)
With Variant 6: New Suns (2022), Fall and Decline (2021)
With Alkemie: A Worthy Mirror (2026), Love to My Liking (2023), A Fine Companion (2023)
With Lorelei: GRAMMY-nominated Beauford Scales (2024)
With Blue Heron: Christmas & New Year’s in 15th-Century France & Burgundy (2024)
With Clarion Choir: GRAMMY-nominated Rachmaninoff All-Night Vigil ('Vespers'), op. 37 (2023)
With LyricFest: Daren Hagen: The Art of Song (2024)
With The Thirteen: Monteverdi: The ‘Lost’ Vespers (2024)