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Department of Music
Peggy Balensuela
 Mezzo-soprano Peggy Balensuela joined the ISU music faculty of Indiana State University in 1989. At ISU, Dr. Balensuela teaches a variety of courses in the Voice Division. She earned the Bachelors, Masters, and Doctoral degrees in Voice Performance and Literature from Indiana University. In April 2001, Dr. Balensuela was awarded the ISU Educational Excellence Award “in recognition of her outstanding accomplishments as an educator in the College of Arts and Sciences at Indiana State University.”
An active recitalist and concert soloist, Dr. Balensuela has been a featured artist with many regional orchestras across the United States. Her repertoire includes the standards of oratorio (i.e. Handel’s Messiah, Bach’s St. Matthew Passion, Verdi’s Requiem, etc.) as well as works such as Brahms’ Alto Rhapsody and Chinary Ung’s Mohori. As a chamber musician, she has been invited to be an artist/fellow at the Aspen Music Festival and the Bach Aria Festival. She is equally at home performing Broadway standards.
Recent engagements have taken Balensuela to South America: in 2003, to Bolivia, as a guest artist with the Songs Across the Americas Festival, which brought together singers, composers, and music historians from the USA and five Andean countries to share song traditions of both continents; and in August 2006, to Peru, as a soloist with the Trujillo 13th Festival Internacional Bach.
Balensuela has been recognized nationally as a specialist in the songs of American composer/poet/music publisher Carrie Jacobs Bond. In May 2006, Wisconsin Public Television featured Dr. Balensuela in the Hometown Series spotlighting Jacobs Bond’s hometown of Janesville, Wisconsin. In 2001, Albany Records released a recording Songs My Grandmother Taught Me: Songs of Carrie Jacobs Bond (TROY 438) produced by Balensuela and ISU colleague, Dr. William Hughes, piano. With Dr. Hughes, Dr. Balensuela has presented a number of lecture/recitals highlighting the life and songs of Jacobs Bond.
Balensuela is a member of the National Association of Teachers of Singing, the Society of American Music, the College Music Society, and is a Sigma Alpha Iota “Friend of the Arts.”
D.M.A., M.M., B.M. Indiana University.
Office: CA 201
Phone: (812) 237-2762
 E-Mail: pbalensuela@isugw.indstate.edu
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