Draft:Antonia Felix

Antonia Felix
Born	Toni Jean Berg (1957-12-15)15 December 1957 Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States
Occupation	Writer, singer
Alma mater	Metropolitan State University
Spouse	Stanford Felix (1986-present)
Website
antoniafelix.com

Antonia Felix (born 15 December 1957) is an American author, biographer, novelist, playwright, singer, educator and composer of classical music based in Minnesota. She is the author of several notable biographies, as well as a novel and a play, and has held a variety of teaching posts.

Biography

Felix was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, but was raised mainly in Shakopee, Minnesota, where she graduated from high school. She has also lived in Madison, Wisconsin (1977-79), Minneapolis (1979-89), New York City (1989-2002), Kingsville, Texas (2002-04), and Lawrence and Emporia, Kansas (2004-11). She presently lives in Farmington, Minnesota. Her post-secondary education began at Normandale Community College, which she attended in 1976-77 and the University of Wisconsin–Madison, which she attended between 1977 and 1979 as a student of bassoon and voice. She next attended Metropolitan State University between 1985 and 1988 to earn a B.A. degree in Psychology, and later pursued graduate studies between 2002 and 2004 at Texas A&M University–Kingsville to earn an M.A. degree in English Language and Literature. She also earned an M.F.A. degree in Creative Writing at Wichita State University, which she attended between 2007 and 2011. She studied for a shorter period at the Mannes College of Music (2002). She received an Ed.D. degree in Educational Leadership at Minnesota State University, Mankato, in 2024. As an educator, she has served as an Adjunct Professor of Creative Writing at Hamline University. She has also served as an Instructor in English at Emporia State University (2006-08) and a Visiting Instructor of English at Sunlin University in Pohang, South Korea. She is now an Assistant Professor in Education at Minnesota State University, Mankato. She is married to the singer, singing teacher, impresario and arts administrator Stanford Felix.

Activities and awards

Felix has been active as a professional singer of opera and vocal music in classical style since the 1990s, with frequent appearances in the United States and Europe. Her operatic roles include the title role of Aida in Verdi’s ‘’Aida’’ at the Amato Opera in New York City, Donna Elvira in Mozart’s ‘’Don Giovanni’’ at the Tweed theaterworks Festival in New York City, and Musetta in a Queens Opera Cameo Production of Puccini’s ‘’La Bohème’’. She has toured with I Virtuosi di Praga in Prague and Plzeň and performed recitals at the American Cathedral and Salle Alfred Cortot in Paris, and the Vishnevskaya Performing Arts School in Moscow. Her compositions include works for voice, piano, and a variety of instruments, some in collaboration with the choreographer Jody Weber for the Weberdance Company in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Her ‘’Magnificat’’ for voice and organ has been performed regularly at the annual Bach Vespers series at Trinity Lutheran Church in New York City.

The centerpiece of Felix’s career as a writer is a series of biographies, mainly of prominent figures in government, politics and the arts. Specifically, the subjects of these biographies are John MacNally (1994); Harry Connick Jr. (1995); Christine Todd Whitman (1996); Andrea Bocelli (1999); Audrey Santo (2001); Laura Bush (2002); Condoleeza Rice (2002); Wesley Clark (2004}; Tony DeBlois (2005); Sonia Sotomayor (2010); Michelle Obama (2017); Elizabeth Warren (2018), and Ruth Bader Ginsburg (2019). The biography of Condoleeza Rice was a New York Times national bestseller.

As an author of children’s books in the Young Readers Series published by John Wiley & Sons in 1997 and 1998, she was included in the Children’s Best Books of the Year List of the American Association for the Advancement of Science for ‘’Can It Really Rain Frogs?’’ and ‘’Shake, Rattle, and Roll’’. Felix has published a novel, ‘’Fatal Remedy’’ of 2014, and written a play based on the life of the opera singer Maria Callas, ‘’La Divina’’, which was produced by the Minnesota Concert Opera at the Cowles Center for Dance and the Performing Arts in Minneapolis in 2015.

Books

• ’’Ireland’s Own John MacNally: A Life in Song’’ (New York: Spi Books, 1994)
• ’’Wild About Harry: The Illustrated Biography of Harry Connick, Jr.’’ (Dallas: Tyler, 1995), ISBN 9780878338986
• ’’Christmas in America’’ (New York: Todtri, 1999) ISBN 9780762405947
• ’’Andrea Bocelli: A Celebration’’ (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999), ISBN 9780312267100
• ’’Silent Soul: The Miracles and Mysteries of Audrey Santo’’ (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2001), ISBN 9781466838833
• ’’Laura: America’s First Lady, First Mother’’ (Boston: Adams Media, 2002), ISBN 9781580628914
• ’’Condi: the Condoleeza Rice Story (New York: Newmarket Press, 2002), ISBN 9780310269687
• ’’Wesley K. Clark: A Biography’’ (New York: Newmarket Press, 2004, ISBN 9781557046253
• ’’Some Kind of Genius: The Extraordinary Journey of Musical Savant Tony Deblois’’ (Emmaus, Penn.: Rodale, 2005), ISBN 1594862737 (with Janice Deblois)
• Sonia Sotomayor: The True American Dream (New York: Berkley Books, 2010), ISBN 9781410428973
• Fatal Remedy: A Novel (Minneapolis: Calumet Editions, 2015), ISBN 9781939548191
• ’’Michelle Obama: a Photographic Journey’’ (New York: Sterling, 2017), ISBN 9781454926368
• ’’Elizabeth Warren: Her Fight, Her Work, Her life’’ (Naperville, Illinois: Sourcebooks, 2018), ISBN 9781492665281
• ’’Notre-Dame de Paris: History, Art, and Revival from 1163 to Tomorrow’’ (New York: Sterling, 2019), ISBN 9781454938316
• ’’A Short Biography of Ruth Bader Ginsburg” (Carlisle, Massachusetts: Benna Books, 2019), ISBN 9781944038694
• ’’Resurrection: Poems” (Mankato, Minnesota: Minnesota State University, 2025), ISBN 9798218681975

Children’s Books

• ’’Prayers and Meditations for Children’’ (New York: Pinnacle, 1996) ISBN 0765191989

From the Young Readers Series: Spencer Christian’s World of Wonders (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1997-98):

• ’’Can It Really Rain Frogs?’’
• ’’Shake, Rattle, and Roll’’
• ’’Is There a Dinosaur in Your Backyard’’
• ’’What Makes the Grand Canyon Grand?”

Play

‘’La Divina’’, based on the life of Maria Callas, first performed at the Cowles Center for Dance and the Performing Arts in Minneapolis in 2015 starring Andrea-Lynn Cianflone as Maria Callas.

External links

• Antonia Felix website
• Antonia Felix biography

Category:1957 births Category:Living people Category:American biographers Category:American playwrights Category:American opera singers Category:St. Olaf College alumni Category:Metropolitan State University alumni Category:Hamline University faculty Category:21st-century women writers Category:Writers from Minnesota Category:People from Shakopee, Minnesota Category:People from Minneapolis