Mary Hoskins chosen as second place winner for Classical Emerging Professional category
Though she grew up surrounded by music, Mary Hoskins had no plans to pursue it as a career. “My family sang all the time,” she said. “It was just something we did for fun. It wasn't until I was done with high school that I even started to think of it as something people did for work.” All that changed after applying to the BYU School of Music on the advice of vocalist and summer camp director Isaac Hurtado. Now an accomplished vocalist, Hoskins has made a name for herself in a highly competitive field. Her most recent honor is winning second place in the Classical Emerging Professional category of the CS (Classical Singer) Music Online Competition. The winners, chosen from among thousands of audition videos, were announced during a live online final round. “Getting feedback from people like Robert Ainsley of Washington National Opera, Frederica von Stade, Nathan Gunn and Denyce Graves was incredible,” Hoskins said of her experience. “They were so encouraging and gave me a direction to keep working on my voice. I think my favorite moment was when Nathan Gunn said I made my aria sound like ‘Happy Birthday.’ In other words, I made it look easy. That meant a lot.” Read the full article at music.byu.edu.