Music has been part of Michelle Manning’s life for about as long as she can remember.
The Rocky Mount native just started her senior year as a choral music education major and, on Sept. 19-20, will perform in the chorus for Opera Roanoke’s presentation of Verdi’s “La Traviata.”
But she can trace her path in song all the way back to kindergarten, when her elementary music teacher heard her young voice’s potential and started giving her solos in school concerts.
“She saw something in me,” Manning recalled, and that early encouragement helped fuel her enthusiasm through middle and high school, when she started winning singing competitions. In her teens, she attended a statewide summit for music teachers that also helped forge her desire to pursue her education in that field.
“I was there seeing all of these professionals attend this conference and I was like, yeah, I could really see myself doing this,” she said.
Big life plans, however, don’t always follow a straight line.
Immediately after high school, Manning began attending college in Central Virginia. Expenses became a constant challenge, as was the typical undergraduate learning curve.
“I’m a first-generation college student, and I was working multiple jobs; I was 18, learning to be an adult and be in school,” she explained. Ultimately, splitting her time between her studies and work proved unsustainable, and at the close of her sophomore year, she put her education on hold.
Manning stayed busy, just not in the field she loved. After a few years, it was music that lured her back to a different kind of classroom. At that time, Franklin County Public Schools had recently lost its choir teacher, and the system brought Manning on as a long-term substitute.
By then, she was a little older and more seasoned, and that experience gave her the charge she needed.
“When I got the chance to go back and teach high school choir and music theory, that really made me realize, I love this, I want to do it,” she said. “I knew I really needed to go back to school and finish my degree.”
A former high school choir teacher suggested Manning take a look at Radford, and she was attracted to the university’s history as a teacher’s college as well as its affordability.
Almost immediately, the tempo felt different. Manning got deeply involved in Radford’s music community, taking leadership roles with the local branches of the National Association for Music Education and the American Choral Directors Association and also assisting during Department of Music auditions.
She still relies on part-time jobs to make ends meet, but now there’s a clear soundtrack to it all – she’s a work study in the music department; she teaches private piano and voice lessons; she’s in her third year of working with Opera Roanoke’s young artist program; and, in spring 2024, she had a major role in Radford’s production of “Dido and Aeneas,” for which she also served as a stage manager as part of her Honors College contract.
“It’s definitely a lot,” Manning acknowledged of the multiple hats she now wears, “but I’m very thankful that all of my jobs and all of my sources of income are music-based, and it’s something I love.
“And I’m so happy to give back to the university and the department that’s helping my dreams come true.”
Opera Roanoke will present “La Traviata” on Sept. 19 and 20 at 2:30 p.m.