Anne-Marie Donovan has contributed to the artistic process in many ways. She is a performer, director, teacher and producer.

 A native of Montreal, she grew up in a family of musicians and pursued studies in theatre, movement and music from an early age. After graduating from McGill University in voice performance in 1985, Anne-Marie felt the need to round off her strictly musical university experience with more in-depth work in the other areas of performance stage craft. She joined the Music Theatre Studio Ensemble at The Banff Centre for one year and then went on to study theatre and movement in Toronto.

Anne-Marie began performing extensively as a recitalist, chamber musician and interpreter of 20th century music. She built strong associations with living composers, many of whom have chosen her as a vehicle for their expression. Mezzo-soprano

In 1990, Anne-Marie co-founded the Blue Rider Ensemble with some of Canada's finest chamber musicians. Their interpretation of Arnold Schoenberg's Pierrot lunaire led to an invitation to perform at the Schoenberg Retrospective in Barcelona, Spain, and the ensemble's recording of that work has been met with great critical acclaim. Blue Rider has since toured with many different concert programs and premiered Mounting Picassso, an music theatre work by Peter Hatch.

In 1992 Anne-Marie founded the MIRROR IMAGE vocal ensemble, a multidisciplinary chamber ensemble of solo voices. MIRROR IMAGE came together to perform Stimmung, a landmark work by Karlheinz Stockhausen using the Eastern technique of overtone singing. The ensemble's interpretation of Stimmung led to many invitations from concert societies and composers and MIRROR IMAGE has gone on, under Anne-Marie's direction, to produce one major new production every year.

While performing with these two ensembles, Anne-Marie continued to appear as a soloist. She was invited to perform the premiere of Dreaming Lolita by Sid Robinovich with the Winnipeg Symphony at the Winnipeg New Music Festival. She premiered Insomnia by Barbara Croall with the Composer's Orchestra in Toronto. Recital appearances included Brandon University, University of British Columbia, The Music Gallery For Openers Festival in Toronto and Oscar Pederson Hall and Pollack Hall in Montreal.

In 1994 Anne Marie became artistic director of NUMUS Inc., one of Canada's most active new music societies, a post she kept until spring 2000.  During her tenure, NUMUS brought  its voice to a wide-ranging audience, regularly playing to capacity houses, which grew by an average of 50% each year. Under Anne-Marie's leadership, NUMUS had many artistic accomplishments: a thriving concert series; the establishment of a series of concerts for children; educational programs for people of all ages; competitions to nurture young professional performers and composers; the release of NUMUS' first CD;  and cooperative ventures with many other arts organizations. Anne-Marie's tenure with NUMUS culminated in a hugely successful and inspiring three-day festival in February 2000. 'MAKROKOSMOPOLITAIN' celebrated the chamber music of the great American composer, George Crumb, with concerts, lectures, master classes and composer seminars, and George Crumb was NUMUS' guest and composer-in-residence for the festival.

As far back as 1990, Anne-Marie began to bring her multidisciplinary experience to bear on her work with the Blue Rider Ensemble, MIRROR IMAGE and NUMUS, exploring the middle ground where music and theatre meet. Her staging of Claude Vivier's Lovesongs (MIRROR IMAGE), has been met with praise and accolades and her one-woman show, Alphabaret, presented an overview of the 20th century by choosing a composer for each letter of the alphabet from Laurie Anderson through the likes of Brian Eno, Joan La Barbara and Meridith Monk to Frank Zappa. Alphabaret played to sell-out crowds each night.

She has also gone on to direct many works for other organizations, from cabaret and opera to theatre and sound installations. These include: A Soniferous Garden by Richard Wyndeyer at the Open Ears Festival of Music and Sound (sound and performance installation); Life Out Loud by Linda Carson (theatre) at the Annex Theatre in Toronto and the Registry Theatre in Waterloo; A 1920's Cabaret at the St. Jacob's Schoolhouse (concept and direction); and The Sinking of the Titanic, by Gavin Bryars, arranged by Richard Wyndeyer, at the Open Ears Festival of Music and Sound (sound and performance installation). She has recently begun assisting the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony in the presentation of their concerts and remains involved with NUMUS Inc. as the director of their opera in development, Screen Test, by librettist John Sobol and composer Tim Brady. 

In the past few seasons, Anne-Marie has performed with the Penderecki Quartet, the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, at the Elora Festival, the Festival de Musica de Camera in San Miguel, Mexico, the 2000 Rhodes/Anderson Cave Concerts in Napa, California, Espace Musique in Ottawa, the Canadian Chamber Ensemble, in recital at La Chapelle Historique du Bon Pasteur in Montreal, at the MidAmerican Center for Contemporary Music at Bowling Green State University in Ohio and on a cross-Canada tour with electric guitarist Tim Brady and his ensemble, Bradyworks. She also released a recording of Brahms songs with the Streicher Ensemble on the label DoReMi.

She has commissioned, directed and/or premiered works by Canadians Glenn Buhr, Peter Hatch, Peter Hannan, John Oswald, Linda C. Smith, Tim Brady, Omar Daniel, Christos Hatzis and Barbara Croall, to name a few, as well as many works by international composers such as Donald Crockett, Julian Grant and Steve Kohn. Anne-Marie has also recorded many of these works on the Marquis Classics, A&R Records, ARTIFACT and Ghandarva labels.

Anne-Marie is active as an educator and has taught in the Drama and Speech & Commmunication Department at the University of Waterloo since 1993.  She also works through TRACE, the teaching resources centre at the university, giving effective communication and spoken voice workshops for staff and faculty. Anne-Marie has twice been nominated for the Distinguished Teacher Award at the University of Waterloo.

Anne-Marie lives in Waterloo, Ontario with her son, Michael, and her husband, Paul Pulford.