QVCF 2025 Adjudicators

Hayley Sugars

  • Open Sections

  • Operatic Aria Section

Hayley was a member of the Opera Queensland Young and Developing Artist Program (2007-2009). She has enjoyed success in many national competitions, including the German-Australian Opera Grant, which she won in 2010. This resulted in contracts with the Hessisches Staatstheater Wiesbaden and the Landestheater Coburg, where she was a resident soloist performing a wide range of mezzo-soprano roles.

 Operatic repertoire includes Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni, the title role in Rinaldo, Mrs Grose in The Turn of the Screw, Rosina in The Barber of Seville, Varvara in Katja Kabanova, Flora Bervoix in La traviata, Mirabella in Der Zigeunerbaron, Suzuki in Madama Butterfly, Cherubino in The Marriage of Figaro,  Dido in Dido and Aeneas, Valencienne in The Merry Widow, Prince Orlovsky in Die Fledermaus, Brangäne in Tristan and Isolde, Auntie in Peter Grimes and Marcellina in Le nozze di Figaro. Hayley also toured state-wide extensively with seasons of A Night with Opera Queensland and Waltzing Our Matilda.

 Since returning to Australia, Hayley has performed to great acclaim for Opera Queensland, New Zealand Opera and The Brisbane Festival. Most recently, she was a featured soloist in Opera at Jimbour, the First Witch in Dido & Aeneas and appeared as Alisa from Lucia di Lammermoor as part of Opera Queensland’s first Bel Canto Festival in 2024. In March, Hayley will appear once more in OQ’s Bel Canto Festival as Tisbe in La Cenerentola.

 

 

Susie French

  • Music Theatre Sections

Susie was one of the first singers accepted into the Associate Diploma in Jazz at the Queensland Conservatorium of Music (1985). She went on to study classical singing with teachers such as Raymond Connell and Margreta Elkins, finally settling into a career in Musical Theatre which spanned forty years.

She worked extensively with Queensland Theatre in productions including The Sentimental Bloke, Baby, Animal Farm, Spring Song, Seven Little Australians, Snoopy the Musical and Threepenny Opera. For Opera Queensland, she performed in La Forza Del Destino and The Flying Dutchman. For QPAC, she appeared in Dancing on the Walls of Paris. She has toured extensively in productions for Kite and the Queensland Arts Council.

Susie has worked for many of the major producers in Australia, touring in productions of Pirates of Penzance, Secret Garden, The Sound of Music, Mame, Menopause the Musical and Mamma Mia.

Her performance as Dr Lillian Cooper in A Girl’s Guide to World War won her a Matilda Award for Best Supporting Actor in 2019.

Susie is devoted to sharing her musical theatre experience with the next generation of Australian performers. She is currently Musical Director at Little Seed Theatre Company in Noosa and teaches acting and singing for musical theatre privately under her Maleny business, Singing in the Range.

BRETT HOLLAND

  • Open and Emerging Sections

Brett Holland holds a Bachelor of Music at the Queensland Conservatorium, Graduate Diploma Education at QUT and Master of Philosophy (Music) from the University of Queensland.

Brett’s conducting vocation started with conducting large choral and orchestral works as a young graduate when he was music director for the Queensland University Musical Society; and, as a Masters Candidate he continued that path despite a focus on singing studying conducting with John Dingle and Dr John Nickson.  Brett has conducted Carmina Burrana, Haydn’s Nelson Mass, Vivaldi Gloria, Cherubini Requiem, Rutter’s When Icicles Hang, Zadok the Priest among many other grand choral pieces.

He has sung professionally with Opera Queensland, Opera Australia and as the Bass Soloist for many works, concerts and numerous ensembles over the last 20 years. Some of Brett’s recent engagements for Opera Quennsland were the roles of Caiaphas (St Matthew Passion), King Ivan (Candide) and Il Commissario (Madame Butterfly). Other recent engagements include solo Baritone for Belshazzar’s Feast, solo Bass for Haydn’s Seven Last Words of Christ, solo Bass for Bach’s Christmas Oratorio, Adjudicator for the Townsville Eisteddfod (2013, 2018, 2022), Adjudicator Queensland Catholic Schools Music Festival, Choral workshop clinician for the Bramble Bay Cluster Workshop, Townsville Sings Festival, SingFest (St Peter’s), SingFest (Sunshine Coast), Macgregor Cluster Choral Workshop, Paul Moreton Workshop among many others. Brett has presented teacher workshops for Opera Queensland, Queensland Orchestra Teacher Professional Development Day as well as for PMSA and in combination with festivals and adjudication.

In 2019 Brett was assistant director (Children’s Chorus) for Opera Queensland’s Tosca at QPC and over the years a large number of Brett’s students have sung professionally as well as studying singing locally and internationally. Brett is in great demand as a vocal teacher, adjudicator, conductor, guest choral clinician and has been the Director of Choral and Vocal Studies at the Brisbane Boys’ College for the past nineteen years.