WHAT an amazing year it’s been for Canberra soprano and School of Music graduate,  Lorina Gore. 

She’s performed for Opera Australia as Leila in “The Pearl Fishers,” Despina in “Così fan tutte,” Yum-Yum in “The Mikado,” Tytania in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” and Queen of Night in “The Magic Flute”.

Then, she won a Helpmann nomination as best supporting female opera performer for her role as Pip in “Moby Dick” for State Opera of South Australia.

She’s even sung at breakfast on Bondi Beach.

Now, though it turns out she’s been keeping it under wraps for some months, Richard Bonynge has presented her with the Australian Opera Auditions Committee’s $20,000 Dame Joan Sutherland scholarship at the AOAC’s 35th annual “Highlights of Opera” concert in the Concert hall at Chatswood.

Gore says the scholarship will  help with the costs of a music career and assist with her plans to record a CD and launch a website, adding that it was listening to the late Dame Joan’s recordings that had made her want to be an opera singer.

Who can doubt that 2013 will be even more splendid for Gore? We’ll see her here performing with the Canberra Symphony Orchestra and in her spare time, she’ll be singing sing Musetta in “La Bohème,” Nanetta in “Falstaff” and Oscar in “Un ballo in Maschera” and Woglinde in “The Ring”.