From the time she was a little girl, she wanted to be a missionary.

"I felt really called by God."

Today she is . . . sort of.

"God wants me to be a missionary?to impact the people God has put me with. I jokingly refer to them as ?my unreached people group.' To be a missionary, you must learn the language and culture of that people group and become acclimatized to them, so that you can bring Jesus to them.

"Well, I ?speak' opera!"

Katherine Whyte is a young Canadian singer who is making waves in the international opera world, singing with major opera companies around the globe including the Metropolitan Opera in New York City. She makes her debut in 2011 with the Canadian Opera Company in Toronto.

Her early years were spent at First Alliance in Toronto and later at Paramount Drive Alliance in Hamilton, ON.

Surprisingly for this gifted singer, a serious career in music was ?never on the radar.' As a child, she acknowledges that she loved to sing at all times during the day and night. "When I went to bed I would sing to God," she says candidly, but always with the growing desire to be a missionary.

The Alliance MusicFest contests in Toronto first opened her eyes to the possibilities. She won the contest and then surprised one of the judges who suggested Katherine and her parents speak to her voice coach about some ways to improve.

"I didn't have a voice coach and that shocked her." Following that first MusicFest, Katherine went on to compete for the next five years and found that it was a real kick-start to her career.

With music now firmly in her sights, she got her degree in music from the University of Toronto and then auditioned for and won a spot? the only soprano in more than 200 applicants?at the famed Julliard School of Music in New York.

"For someone to pursue a career in opera or music, it is vital that you be in the United States," she explains. "You need to be seen and heard by American companies and American management."

After two years at Julliard, she began to experience some struggles to get her career started. "I struggled with God," she remembers, "wondering why all the auditions for young artist programmes were not working out. If he brought me to the U.S., then why wasn't it working out?"

As her student visa looked like it might run out, she surrendered to God. "I thought, why fight it? If it is his will for me to be in Canada working at Tim Horton's then that's where I will be happy." Within a short time, the Metropolitan Opera came calling, offering her a contract.

Since then, she has sung a variety of roles in operas such as The Marriage of Figaro and La Boheme, in places like San Francisco, France, Italy and London, England with various companies including the San Francisco Symphony and the English National Opera.

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