Linda Ormiston is one of Britain’s most versatile artists - equally at home in opera and operetta, cabaret and concerts and after-dinner speaking!

Born in Motherwell, she graduated MA (Maths and Music) from Glasgow University and then followed the musical road with a DRSAMD from the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama and further study at the London Opera Centre. After a year with English Opera for All, she returned to Scotland and joined Scottish Opera for whom she performed more then 25 roles.

Out of Scotland, she has sung with English National Opera, Welsh National Opera, Opera North, Opera Northern Ireland and Glyndebourne Festival Opera. Abroad, performances have taken her to opera houses and concerts halls all over Europe, North America and Japan. She has sung at many of the major music festivals, including Covent Garden, St. Magnus, Como, Buxton, Aix en Provence and on two occasions at the prestigious Salzburg Festival.

Recent engagements have included concerts all over the UK, Janacek’s Jenufa in France, Offenbach’s Bluebeard at the Buxton Festival, The Merry Widow (with Lesley Garrett!) at Welsh National Opera and several Classic Music cruises with P&O, on which she directs an ad hoc choir of passengers in a semi-staged performance of a Gilbert and Sullivan operetta!

In 1999, she received an honorary Doctorate of Music from St. Andrews University and in the Queen’s Birthday Honours list of 2001, Linda was awarded the OBE for services to opera.

Throughout her life, she has always had strong links with amateur companies and before becoming a professional singer, was a member of Glasgow’s Orpheus Club for a number of years. She is Honorary President of both the Broughty Ferry Amateur Operatic Society and of the Orpheus Club.

Her love of the music and the stage started with her mother, Muriel Ormiston, who was a well known producer of many clubs throughout Scotland, from Dunoon to Dundee. Having seen several of their recent performances, Linda is greatly looking forward to working with Ayrshire Philharmonic on such a joyous show as The Music Man and she is especially relishing the prospect of collaborating on the production with her great friend and colleague, Andrew Nicol.