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As Santuzza in Cavalleria Rusticana
Andy Metzger - Pensacola News Journal
"Miller is spectacular as Santuzza. Her vocal prowess and intense dramatic interpretation of the role ruled the stage. Audiences will marvel at her work in this role."
Mark Wilkinson - Sound and Noise
"As Santuzza, Dana Beth Miller proved herself a fine actress, capturing the dramatic intensity that the role requires. Her voice was equally dramatic and plenty beautiful. Her performance was captivating."
Elizabeth Withey - The Edmonton Journal
"Dana Beth Miller clawed at my heart with her jaw-dropping vocal performance as Santuzza. The mezzo was the embodiment of betrayal, physically curled over with pain...she owned heartbreak with her whole body. This Santuzza needs to make an album about her anguish; it is bound to go multi-platinum."
Mezzo Soprano Soloist at the Opera de Montreal International Gala
Arthur Kaptainis - The Montreal Gazette
"One newcomer who stood out was Dana Beth Miller, an American mezzo-soprano who brought a fiery tone, firm technique, and old-fashioned sense of theater to "Acerba volutta" from Cilea's Adriana Lecouvreur."
Earl Arthur Love - ConcertoNet, The Classical Music Network
"Some standouts included Dana Beth Miller who blew us away with "Acerba volutta" from Cilea's Adriana Lecouvreur and in the famous quartet from Verdi's Rigoletto. Miller has not only a warm, full-bodied voice with awesome sustaining power, but also a stage presence that should light up any scene."
As Maddalena in Rigoletto
Mike Greenberg - Incident Light
"Dramatic mezzo-soprano Dana Beth Miller was a sultry and lustrous Maddalena, Sparafucile's sister, who appears only for a short time in Act III. It was an act of cruelty to allow the audience so brief a hearing of such a wonderful voice."
David Fleshler - The Miami Herald and South Florida Classical Review
"As Sparafucile’s sister Maddalena, mezzo-soprano Dana Beth Miller was a standout, pleading movingly and in rich tones for her brother to spare the Duke’s life and more than holding up her end in the celebrated quartet."
Jeff Haller - ConcertoNet, The Claasical Music Network
"Dana Beth Miller has a darkness of tone suggesting a contralto more than a mezzo, which she uses to nearly walk off with the opera with her late entrance."
As Carmen with Boston Lyric Opera
Jeremy Eichler - The Boston Globe
"Heading the cast was Dana Beth Miller as a compelling Carmen...her voice is full of alluringly dark colorings and has a heavier weighting well-suited to her character's tragic dimensions."
Thomas Garvey - The Hub Review
"The singing is often sublime, particularly from Dana Beth Miller's Carmen...she is blessed with a memorably rich mezzo, suffused with a smokily tragic allure that's all but perfect for the role."
Kalen Ratzlaff - Opera News
"As Carmen, mezzo-soprano Dana Beth Miller displayed a voice both smoky and rich, which suited her character perfectly."
Rita Reznikova - Going.com/Boston
The title heroine(sung by mezzo-soprano Dana Beth Miller in her BLO debut) keeps the spark alive. She is more raunchy than coquettish, and brings a rawness to the role with a voice full of chutzpah. It is a deep, velvety mezzo soprano that is very becoming of a darker, more mature Carmen."
As the Foreign Princess in Rusalka with Opera Colorado
Marc Shulgold - Opera News
"The biggest voice of the evening belonged to the commanding, foot-stamping Foreign Princess, delivered with gusto and wit by Dana Beth Miller."
As Margared in Lalo's Le Roi d'Ys with the American Symphony at Avery Fisher Hall
Steve Smith - The New York Times
Dana Beth Miller, singing the part here, wielded a rich, substantial voice...along with a winning stage presence that made her character sympathetic even in extremes of self-involved recklessness.
John Yohalem - Opera Today
"Dana Beth Miller has made the best of a transition to a lower fach; her Margared was full of hysterical threats, remorseful asides, and heroic repentance...one appreciated her cool control of a sizable and richly colored mezzo in a long, various and demanding part."
Howard Kissel - The New York Daily News
As the villainess Margared, Dana Beth Miller brought a splendid mezzo-soprano and great dramatic instincts to the role.
Patrick Dillon - Opera Canada
"The "bad" sibling was heated to a stirring boil by mezzo Dana Beth Miller, whose steely, columnar voice, easily emphatic at bottom and tapering to an always exciting top, recalled the Margared I first encountered, Rita Gorr via old EMI LPs.
Philip Gardner - Oberon's Grove
It's quite rare these days to encounter a singer who brings not only a highly individual timbre and a real sense of intensity but also a very personal commitment and passion to what is being sung. We are so accustomed today to hearing singers whose heyday has passed, or cookie-cutter voices from the younger generation, that when someone comes along with something special to offer it is quite a revelation.
Dana Beth Miller's performance as Margared in the American Symphony Orchestra's concert reading of Edouard Lalo's LE ROI D'YS at Avery Fisher Hall was in a way a throwback to earlier times when singers came out and just gave lavishly of themselves, reveling in their own vocal prowess: unafraid of - and in fact totally committed to - buying directly into the emotional context of the music. Ms. Miller has recently shifted from soprano to mezzo; in fact I would be tempted to call her a dramatic contralto. Her voice has a smouldering richness in the lower range and she can punch out the high notes as well. The sound has a colour all its own but more importantly Ms. Miller has a feeling for grandeur of utterance that reminded me at times of Rita Gorr. Margared, a cousin to Wagner's Ortrud, is a princess steeped in melodrama and Ms. Miller wasn't afraid to express the character's violent passions yet she showed great wisdom in keeping everything musical and not resorting to 'effects'.
Link to Oberon's Grove
As Mere Marie in Poulenc's Dialogues des Carmelites with Austin Lyric Opera
Jeanne Claire van Ryzin - Austin American Statesman
"Dana Beth Miller as Mere Marie unleashed torrents of luscious clear tones."
Paul Wooley - ConcertoNet, The Classical Music Network
"Dana Beth Miller's portrayal of Mere Marie almost lost emotional control several times as the mezzo's upper register soared throughout the house. Dramatically, it worked, as she created a Mere Marie that was more strict and commandeering than usual. The mezzo's huge voice boomed, but Miller also managed to find intimacy and pathos during the latter scenes of the second act."
Mike Greenberg - Incident Light
"Dana Beth Miller was a powerhouse in the role of the assistant prioress, Mother Marie."
Arias, Overtures, and Arabesques - Sacramento Opera, Philharmonic Orchestra and Ballet
Edward Ortiz - The Sacramento Bee
"...As always in such concerts, there is a standout performer. This mantle fell to mezzo-soprano Dana Beth Miller, whose radiant and brilliant voice made the largess of the Community Center Theater feel like an intimate European opera house. Miller, who made a stellar debut last year as Desdemona in the Sacramento Opera's production of Verdi's Otello, commanded all three arias she sang. And her voice grew stronger and more complex with each aria. She gave a bracing performance of the "Mon coeur" aria from Camille Saint-Saens' Samson et Dalila. She later offered a tantalizing performance of "Acerba volutta" from the opera Adriana Lecouvreur by Francesco Cilea. But the highlight of the evening was her super-focused take on "O mio Fernando" from Donizetti's La Favorita. In this her voice radiated richness and power, as if it were a fiery candle vanquishing the darkness of a dank, loveless room."
As the Mother and Witch in Opera Cleveland's Hansel and Gretel
Donald Rosenberg - The Cleveland Plain Dealer
"Dana Beth Miller made a tour de force of the dual roles of the Mother (actually Hansel and Gretel's stepmother) and the Witch. As the former, Miller deftly walked the tightrope between parental rage and wifely affection. Transformed into cookie-monster hag, she spit out words with cackling pleasure and sent her voluminous mezzo-soprano into orbit. She didn't fly on a broom, but the portrayal soared."
As Desdemona in Verdi's Otello:
Ben Allaway - The Des Moines Register
"Desdemona was portrayed by Dana Beth Miller, a drop-dead gorgeous young soprano with an equally voluptuous tone. Add fine acting skills and you have quite a performer, utterly captivating in her sincerity and devotion to Otello. Her "Willow Song" was masterful in her voice's ability to evoke her character's vulnerability and virtue."
Mark Thomas Ketterson - Opera News
"Whatever the genre, Desdemona can potentially steal the evening, as Dana Beth Miller nearly did here. Her opulent spinto crowned the ensembles with a laser-bright gleam, and the pianissimo employed for the exposed final ascent in the "Ave Maria" was ravishing."
Edward Ortiz - The Sacramento Bee
"In the last act of Verdi's Otello, a doomed Desdemona sings two back-to-back arias like a woman who knows she's as much dead as alive. These were delivered with gut-wrenching power by soprano Dana Beth Miller...The evening proved to be a game of contrasts that ranged from the sublime to the ordinary. It was Miller, in her Sacramento Opera debut, who provided the sublime. She did so with a powerful and rich soprano that radiated warmth and depth. This, in turn, gave true dimension to the role of Desdemona. During the all-important arias "Willow Song" and "Ave Maria" in the last act, Miller sang with deeply felt emotion. She gave the character an intriguing patina that conveyed pathos and dramatic grit."
Classical Singer Convention Opening Session
Lindsey Dickson - Classical Singer Magazine
"Convention attendees couldn't help but hold their collective breath during the opening session of the Classical Singer 2007 Convention on the evening of Thursday, May 24. Dana Beth Miller, last year's Professional Division first-place winner, stunned the audience to silence with her performance of "To this we've come" from Menotti's The Consul. Her divine presentation brought out the drama of the aria - the same aria that won her the first prize at the Professional Division Finals Concert in Philadelphia last year. A year later, it is clear: Dana Beth Miller is a force to be reckoned with on the operatic scene."
As Magda Sorel in The Consul:
Kathleen Allen - Arizona Daily Star
"Soprano Dana Beth Miller has the presence, the voice, the stamina and acting chops to carry off the constantly on-stage role of Magda. Her voice soared, her grief was palpable, and when she sang "To this we've come" in the second act, the audience in the Tucson Music Hall held its breath."
Maria Nockin - Opera Japonica
"Dana Beth Miller was a credible and robust-voiced Magda who succeeded in involving the audience emotionally with her travails."
Merola Grand Finale at the San Francisco Opera:
Octavio Roca – The San Francisco Chronicle
"There was something for everyone, so I may as well start with the beginning and the evening’s biggest find. Her name is Dana Beth Miller, and it takes no great seer to predict that we are going to be hearing a lot from this Texan soprano.
…Miller was something else. She had no trouble filling the house with a ravishing, creamy tone produced with sensual control and canny breath support. If her Suzel [L’amico Fritz] made one sit up and listen, her Suor Angelica later drew cheers. In “Senza mamma,” the ecstatic climax of Puccini’s tale of a nun’s sing and redemption, Miller was devastating. Her gestures were simple and rang true, and so did her singing."
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