After completing her studies as a Peter Moores Scholar at the Royal Northern College of Music in the UK, Ali began her career as one of Simone Young’s Young Artists at Opera Australia before continuing as a principal soprano with the company, performing over 26 roles, including Zerlina (Don Giovanni), Papagena (The Magic Flute), Ninette (Love of Three Oranges), Marcellina (Fidelio), Yum Yum (The Mikado) & Adele (Die Fledermaus) and a Green Room award-winning Clorinda in Cenerentola.

She also performed Zerlina in Don Giovanni for NZ Opera, the title role of The Merry Widow for Melbourne Opera, and most recently, Desirée in A Little Night Music & The Fly in Happy End, both for Victorian Opera.

As an award-winning cabaret performer, she has performed everywhere from Glastonbury to Carnegie Hall and was Artistic Director of the Adelaide Cabaret Festival 2016-2018 & 2023. She was nominated for an ARIA award in 2014 for her children’s album Jazzamatazz! and, in 2015, was awarded a Green Room Award for her contribution to cabaret.

After successful seasons at Adelaide Cabaret Festival and the Sydney Opera House, Ali won a Helpmann Award for her cabaret show Yma Sumac – The Peruvian Songbird. She has recently been at the forefront of a wave of new Australian opera, concept creating and starring in Lorelei for Victorian Opera and, after forming FLUXUS, co-producing and starring in The Call for Opera Queensland & Brisbane Festival in 2022.

Following her show-stopping rendition of Radiohead’s Creep in Melbourne Symphony Orchestra’s Performance of a Lifetime in 2021, Ali took to the stage with MSO in 2023 for her first solo concert at Hamer Hall, which was received with rapturous critical acclaim.

She is the current Artistic Director of Stonnington Opera Classics so far delivering two hugely successful community programs in 2022 & 2023.

Ali is the recipient of the Australia Council Fellowship for 2023/24, which will see her creating the FLUXUS Opera Lab, a framework for creating more contemporary Australian work for the operatic stage.