Soprano Renée Fleming critiques a vocal performance student. / Photo by Lauren Virnoche

Opera superstar Renée Fleming sold out Pick-Staiger Concert Hall on Tuesday, and she was only teaching a class.

The Grammy award-winning star opened the class by apologizing to the audience, saying “I’m sorry I’m a bass today, I sang [La] Traviata last night.” Fleming was in town to perform Verdi’s La Traviata at the Chicago Lyric Opera.

The master class was run like a mini-performance, with the soloists singing for the instructor and the audience of older opera fans and NU students. Fleming critiqued each of the four performers, who were masters students in vocal performance at Northwestern. Mezzo soprano Jessica Ann Best, tenor John Eric Rutherford, and bass Nikolas Wenzel performed. The scheduled soprano fell ill, but was replaced by another student.

While coaching Best on her acting, Fleming blurted, “I don’t think you’re gonna do something completely tasteless…but you should try it.”

After four performance classes spanning 20 minutes each, Fleming held a 25-minute question and answer session for the audience. Audience members asked about a variety of topics, including how she prepares for a performance and for her thoughts on singing while pregnant.

The audience took their feet as Fleming left the stage, beaming and blowing kisses to her fans and admirers.

Fleming made it clear that she was very happy to be teaching a class at Northwestern, even though she almost didn’t make it to NU. Dean Toni-Marie Montgomery of the School of Music was seated next to Fleming at an opera performance almost two years ago and asked her to teach a master class. Although Fleming agreed, Montgomery then could not get through to her managers to schedule a class. As chance would have it, she ran into Fleming at an event a couple of months later and was able to get a date scheduled.