Biography

          A Tokyo, Japan native, Mahoko Taniguchi is a classically trained musician, soprano singer in Boston, MA. As a singer, her repertoire encompasses Baroque cantatas and oratorios, 18th-21st century art songs, operas, chamber music, and musical theater. At the top of her class, Mahoko studied with mezzo-soprano Elena Obraztsova, and was involved with several opera productions at the Tokyo Metropolitan Theatre. Both in Japan and in America, she has appeared in many concerts, opera galas, and musical theater concerts, performing Susanna in Le Nozze di Figaro, Annina in The Saint of Bleecker Street, Jade Boucher in Dead Man Walking and The First Mouse in Robert Sirota’s The Tailor of Gloucester at the Boston Athenaeum.

She holds merit scholarships from both Longy School of Music and the Boston Conservatory, each for two and four consecutive years; In 2016, she was selected to sing with the Boston Conservatory Contemporary Percussion Chamber Ensemble’s performance of George Crumb’s American Songbooks—A Journey Beyond Time.

She was a soprano winner of the RICCO vocal competition and she made her debut as the soprano soloist in Haydn’s Mass in Time of War for the 60th anniversary season of the Rhode Island Civic Chorale and Orchestra concert in 2017. Following the US debut, she appeared on stage performing with MetroWest Symphony Orchestra. In 2020, she won the First Prize in International Music Competition Grand Prize Virtuoso that gave her an opportunity to make her European debut at the Elgar Room, Royal Albert Hall in London. Also, she was the first prize winner in Professional Category at the Québec Music Competition 2020 in Canada, the first prizewinner in Voice-CategoryE at Muse International Music Competition. In Japan, the First Prize winner with Harris Award at the 12th Shimoda International Music Competition in 2024. As an active collaborative musician, she often works with composers and premieres their new works.

          Both in Japan and the U.S, she has been taking acting training for stages since she was in her teenage. She had completed a summer intensive acting program at Butai Geijyutsu Gakuin in Tokyo, also, had kept privately studying with some Japanese actors. In the U.S., she had been learning acting for singers under the directions of Nathan Troup, Johnathan Pape, Candice Brown, Ken Pierce, and Donna Roll, and stage combat training from Ted Hewlett. Also, She has been learning several kinds of dances; classical-ballet, modern-ballet, baroque-dance, and jazz-dance. As a bilingual narrator, at the request of directors and composers, she positively provides her voice works which have been adopted to the theater and contemporary musical works.

          Mahoko holds a Bachelor of Music in Vocal Performance and a Teaching Certificate in Japan from Musashino Academia Musicae, a Graduate Performance Diploma in Opera and a Teaching Artist Certificate from Longy School of Music of Bard College, and a Master of Music in Vocal Performance at The Boston Conservatory at Berklee. She completed the Summer Institute of Contemporary Music Performance Practice 2017 at New England Conservatory. Finally, she graduated from The Boston Conservatory with the Professional Study Certificate with the concentration of Vocal Performance under the tutelage of Kathryn Wright and American English IPA.