In addition to and after a thriving 25-year singing career as a coloratura soprano which led her throughout Europe and as far as Brazil, Catherine Vandevelde built up an impressive career in singing education.
After obtaining a 1st prize with the highest distinction at the KVMC Antwerp for piano (class J. Detiège) and after ten years (1980 - 1990) giving piano lessons at the academies of Herentals and Geel, she fully concentrated on singing.
Shortly after obtaining her diplomas at the KVMC in Antwerp (1st prize singing + Higher Diploma + pedagogical diploma) and at the Maastricht / Netherlands conservatory (UM singing and Opera), she became a singing teacher at the municipal conservatories of Hasselt and Bruges .
After winning national and international prizes (a.o. Oratorium competition/ The Hague, Cristina Deutekom competition/ Enschede, Vinas competition/ Barcelona, ​​Nico Dostal competition/Vienna and IMKEB/ Brussels) between '88 and '92, she also became assistant to professor Bernadette Degelin at the KVMC in Antwerp.
In 2003, however, she devoted herself entirely to developing the vocal department at the samw in Tielt: in addition to regular singing lessons where she always set the bar high, she also founded the young children's choir Bonzaï and the youth choir Banzaï! with which she participated in various symphonic concerts. The youth choir Banzaï! also participated in the Earth Tones CD and tour of the Arco Baleno ensemble with music by Dirk Brossé.
With both choirs and several soloists of her voice class, she created the children's opera De Witte Slang (D. Parmentier / Th. Blondelle) in 2007, accompanied by the Royal Orchestra Zanglust o.l.v. B. Snauwaert, in her own staging at CC Gildhof in Tielt. This performance enjoyed a resounding success.
Catherine also expanded the adult choir of the academy and regularly engaged this group in the productions of the opera class that she also created.
Her students had the opportunity to perform roles on stage in: Dido and Aeneas / Purcell, La Serva Padrona / Pergolesi, The Medium / Menotti, Sweeney Todd / Sondheim (short version), The Telephone / Menotti, Cendrillon / Massenet (shortened) version), Orphée and Eurydice / Gluck-Berlioz, Bluebeard's Castle / Bartok (in Hungarian), excerpts from Don Giovanni / Mozart, Le Nozze di Figaro / Mozart, Cosi fan Tutte / Mozart, Bastien und Bastienne / Mozart, Barbe Bleue / Offenbach,…
In 2013 Catherine Vandevelde was appointed singing professor at LUCA School of Arts / Campus Lemmens in Leuven where she developed on a short time’s notice a large singing class. Here too she works intensively on a sound vocal technical basis (based on the Klettenberg method), on building up an extensive, representative repertoire, on a thorough knowledge of style, with much attention to the pronounciation of the different languages and finally on stage presence and expression.
Many of her students found their way to the big stage and won prizes at major competitions such as: IMKEB, Belvédère, Voix Nouvelles, Neue Stimmen, Vinas, ...