TRANSFORMING
THE ‘TRADITIONAL’ MINDSET
A leading voice for progressive change in the music industry, Dr. Dana Lynne Varga is a clinician, lecturer, and speaker.
Dana brings extensive experience as an entrepreneur, artistic director, performer, voice teacher, lecturer, and writer to her life's work of empowering artists.
Dana is on a mission to transform long-held approaches to artist careers. She regularly writes and speaks about creating a sustainable and fulfilling career in the arts, building a financially stable present and future, entrepreneurship, dealing with burnout and much more.
Previous speaking engagements include Opera America, Juilliard, NATS, New England Conservatory, Boston Conservatory at Berklee, Harvard University, Classical Singer Competition, Boston Singers' Resource, and many others.
More about Dana
Dana has been working as a life and career coach for over ten years, and has been a private studio owner and actively performing soprano for over twenty. A graduate of intensive coach training through Graydin Coaching, Dana draws on her breadth of experience and deep industry knowledge to help musicians find and embrace their own authentic career path. Dana enjoys working with creatives of all ages and from all walks of life.
In addition to maintaining a full private voice studio with a waiting list for over 20 years, Dana served for seven years on the voice faculty at the Longy School of Music of Bard College, seven years on the voice and opera faculty at the BU Tanglewood Institute and two years on the full-time voice faculty at UMass Amherst. She founded MassOpera, a 501c3 non-profit opera company, in 2008 and served as Artistic Director for 17 years.
As a classical soprano, Dana regularly performs a wide variety of repertoire on the opera and concert stages. She has recently appeared as the soloist in the Brahms, Mozart and Fauré Requiems as well as Haydn's Lord Nelson Mass at Carnegie Hall. She recently sang the role of Clorinda in Rossini's La Cenerentola with Boston Lyric Opera and will cover the role of Countess Le Nozze Di Figaro with them in 2027.
Dana holds a Doctor of Musical Arts (DMA) degree from Boston University, Master of Music (MM) degree from New England Conservatory and Bachelor of Music (MM) degree from the University of Massachusetts Amherst.