Mooroolbark local, Kate Pengelly, has been announced as a semi-finalist of the 2026 IFAC Handa Australian Singing Competition.
The competition is hosted by Music and Opera Singers Trust Ltd (MOST), who have held the competition since 1982. The competition supports Australasian singers under 26 years old through scholarships, performance opportunities and professional development.
Ms Pengelly is a 22-year-old soprano who was recently accepted as a semi-finalist in the prestigious singing competition, which will be held in Sydney in August.
“I think it’ll be a really amazing opportunity,” Ms Pengelly said.
Ms Pengelly had her first taste of music when she was four years old and started playing piano. Her interest in singing came later and developed while she was part of the children’s chorus for Carmina Burana.
At seven years old, Ms Pengelly joined the Australian Children’s Choir in Mitcham. She toured Europe with them and performed with her friends in churches and cathedrals across Austria and Germany, which she described as “fantastic.”
Growing up, she busked outside Mooroolbark Coles for almost nine years, and later at markets, a formative experience where she learned to project her voice.
“(Those opportunities) were a lot of fun and part of a very supportive musical community, and I think that made a really big difference.
“They don’t necessarily get to see the impact that it’s had on those people the festival or the concert, they see you whilst you’re there, but they don’t know that 15 years later that was part of your musical journey, or it was part of why you started singing again after a long time of not doing it, so I think it’s really important that we give them the kudos that they deserve,” she said of the supporters of local musical events, festivals and concerts.
Ms Pengelly has drawn inspiration from her teachers and other opera singers such as Carol Vaness and Renée Fleming.
“I think she’s an incredible artist…she has such fearlessness, but also so much control and restraint in her sound,” Ms Pengelly said of American soprano Carol Vaness. “I also love Renée Fleming, particularly her interpretations of Strauss, which is one of my favourite composers.”
She looks up to the two American sopranos, but what made her interested in opera was when she was in the children’s choir as part of a production and heard an orchestra for the first time.
