Corey Grigg is a burgeoning young baritone hailing from Bridgewater, NJ.  Currently based in Chicago, he performs a wide range of opera, operetta, oratorio, and art song repertoire from the Baroque Era to the Twentieth Century.  By utilizing his dynamic stage presence and musicianship, he tackles the challenges of the lyric baritone repertoire, including roles such as Silvio, Figaro, Papageno, Guglielmo, Count Almaviva, Billy Budd, and Danilo.

The 2010-2011 season saw Corey’s debuts as a soloist with several Chicago-area organizations, including the New Philharmonic (Valentine’s Day Pops Concert), the North Shore Choral Society (75th Anniversary Gala Concert), Music of the Baroque (Holiday Choral & Brass Concert), and the UIC String Ensemble (Barber's Dover Beach). During the summer season, he was seen as Count Almaviva in Le nozze di Figaro at the Peninsula Music Festival in Door County, Wisconsin, and as an Apprentice Artist with Chautauqua Opera in Chautauqua, NY. There, in addition to singing the role of Silvio in Leoncavallo’s I pagliacci, he performed as Papageno and Zurga in a concert of opera highlights and delighted the audience in Chautauqua’s historic amphitheater in a concert revue of Lerner and Lowe’s classic musicals with the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra.

At Northwestern University, where he earned a Master of Music with departmental honors under the tutelage of Bruce Hall, Corey’s studies culminated in a recital of works by Finzi, Fauré, and Brahms, as well as a cover performance as Beaumarchais in The Ghosts of Versailles. In February of 2010, he sang in The Marriage of Figaro as Count Almaviva. His performances in 2009 included Figaro in Il barbiere di Siviglia at Northwestern, soloist in Carissimi's oratorios Jonah and Jepthe with Ars Musica Chicago, the role of Ben Budge in Britten's realization of The Beggar's Opera with the Castleton Festival in Castleton, VA, under the baton of Maestro Lorin Maazel. That year he also performed Der Unglauber in Telemann's grand oratorio Der Tag des Gerichts, was the soloist for a nationally televised broadcast of Carmina Burana, and Count Danilo in The Merry Widow at Northwestern University.

Corey attended Northwestern University as undergraduate and earned bachelor’s degrees in Voice and Opera and Mathematics.  A student of Richard Drews, he performed several leading roles, including Guglielmo in Così fan tutte, Belcore in L’elisir d’amore, Demetrius in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and Krušina in The Bartered Bride.  He also performed as a soloist with the University Chorale, singing C.P.E Bach’s Magnificat for the Wisconsin Choral Directors Association’s 2007 conference, with the Slavic Department’s Evening of Russian Opera, and in the ensemble for the premiere of Eric Whitacre’s opera electronica, Paradise Lost.  In addition, Corey continued his acting training, completing the three-year major acting sequence studying with Ann Woodworth.  Besides his musical and academic pursuits, he was captain of the men’s club fencing team, and helped to win the 2005 collegiate club championship.

Corey’s first forays into opera were with the Mason Gross Preparatory School in New Brunswick, NJ, where he developed his interest in opera while studying with Geoffrey Friedley.  He participated in the Rutgers Summer Opera Workshop, where he was a finalist in the aria competition.  Shortly thereafter, he began studying with Lynn Vardaman at Manhattan School of Music’s Preparatory Division in New York City.  During this time he also studied acting at the New Jersey Youth Theater with Cynthia Meryl, and starred in productions at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center and Algonquin Arts Theater as Lieutenant Cable in South Pacific and The Captain / Hennessy in Dames at Sea.  
 
As the winner of the NJMEA All-State Opera competition, he was awarded the Governor’s Award in Arts Education in 2003.  That year he also received the Frederica von Stade Music Scholarship and the Monmouth Civic Chorus Music Scholarship.  A well-rounded musician and student, Corey also won state-level awards as a jazz pianist and bassoonist, and played and sang at the regional and national levels, notably in the 2000 ACDA National Multicultural Honor Choir and the 2003 MENC All-Eastern Orchestra, and was a National Merit Scholarship Finalist and AP Scholar with Distinction.