Patricia O'Callaghan is something of a wandering minstrel. Her fifteen-year career has taken her across genres, continents, and a range of disciplines and passions. She returns to the NAC with a new holiday album "Deepest December" released on Oct. 23. The new album is full of wonderful gems, from 15th century French carols to freshly minted originals. Patricia wrote the title track with Canadian poet Dennis Lee! Andrew Downing wrote the haunting and unique arrangements for a band that ranges from hurdy gurdy to lap steel guitar.

Her recording career spans five solo albums and many interesting visits along the way as a guest on other artists' CDs. A speaker of French, Spanish, and German, her early recordings focused on European cabaret, and she is considered a specialist, most significantly, in the music of Kurt Weill. Patricia has performed his Threepenny Opera, Seven Deadly Sins, and Kleine Mahagonny with Soulpepper Theatre Company, Edmonton Opera, and Vancouver Opera, to name a few.

One of Patricia's most unique talents is the ability blend a variety of languages and musical genres seamlessly together in her concerts, and completely embody whatever style she is singing at any given moment.

She has sung with some of the world's great ensembles and artists (Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Don Byron Quartet, Bryn Terfel), and has performed in venues that range from London's Royal Opera House to New York's Soho cabaret Le Poisson Rouge.

Patricia also writes and co-writes songs and has had the honor of premiering many new compositions, from both the classical and pop worlds. It has been her great privilege to work with such creators as R. Murray Schafer, Dennis Lee, Christos Hatzis, George Aperghis, Steve Reich, and Steven Page, to name a few.

Her most recent recording/touring projects are Broken Hearts and Madmen; a collaboration with The Gryphon Trio, which blends classical music with traditional songs from Latin America and pop songs from around the world.

"This Toronto soprano can sing a 100-year-old German tune so lustily that you almost don't need a translation to know that someone's about to get his throat cut or get laid or both."
-The National Post