The back of singer Joy Barnum’s neck often hurts after a performance. It’s from laughing and smiling so much.

She kicks the stereotype of a sombre, stern opera singer right to the kerb.

“People tell me a lot that I’m not what they expected from an opera singer,” she said.

She studied opera at Oakwood University in Huntsville, Alabama. To graduate in 2011, she had to sing before a panel; she turned protocol on its head.

“You’re supposed to get in, sing to the audience with hands neatly folded, smile faintly and get out,” she said.

But she just couldn’t help herself.

“I wore a straight wig over a huge afro,” she said. “That’s just not heard of. I had incense lit. I ran offstage to change my outfit.

“My teacher had to tell the audience they were in for a ‘unique experience’. I smiled and laughed through my entire performance.”

She got a standing ovation.

Today, she’s “30-something” and still working to deliver unique, joyful experiences to Bermuda audiences.

“I like to have fun,” she said. “Because I am relaxed when I get up on the stage, it sets the audience at ease.”

She describes herself as a “classically trained entertainer”, as she’s spent a good part of her career singing popular songs from the ‘70s.

“I like the song[s],” she said, “but I am capable of so much more.”

Audiences will get to see just how much more on Friday, when she performs her own songs at the Bermuda National Gallery. She’ll follow that up with a performance at the Earl Cameron Theatre next month.

“I also performed jazz covers and requests at the BNG last week,” she said. “I was thrilled when one of the audience members requested one of my own songs. I told her to wait until next week. The April performance will have some surprises in it.”

Miss Barnum is known for multiple costume changes.

“The most I have changed an outfit during an hour-long performance is probably four times,” she said. “After I finish practising the music, I work on my costume changes.

“I have got it down to 13 seconds per costume. I pick a costume depending on how it goes with the music, but also how easy it is to get on and off.

“It excites me to change often.”

She is hesitant to call herself a fashionista.

“I used to teach music at Clearwater Middle School,” she said. “The students were like ‘Miss Barnum, you cannot dress’. But five years later, those same students were like, ‘Those boots are wicked’. So I don’t know if I’m a fashionista or if fashion finally catches up to whatever I am doing for that moment in time. I don’t like recent trends, I just like to do what speaks to me and makes me feel happy.”

Miss Barnum started singing as a young child in the Midland Heights Seventh-day Adventist choir.

“I would cry when I couldn’t hit the notes,” she said. “I was always singing the solos. I don’t know if that was because I was good or because I wasn’t afraid of being fearless.

“I wasn’t going to shy away from an opportunity. If I couldn’t hit the notes I would go downstairs and practice until I could hit them. Then I would come back upstairs and do it.”

She received a scholarship from the Bermuda Institute to attend Oakwood University.

Her parents, Mellonie Furbert and Alan Barnum, were always supportive of her music.

“My parents were totally hippies when I was younger,” she said. “They always told me to do what I loved.”

Five years ago, she toured Europe with another Bermudian singer, Heather Nova. She was once the lead singer for Tony Brannon’s group, The Big Chill.

“I took a break from that to work on my new music,” she said.

“I have three projects in the works all at varying stages of completion but we’re back in talks about summer.”

She said making a living as a singer in Bermuda has been challenging.

“I would say that if you went to school to study opera, you didn’t go to school to make money in Bermuda,” she said.

She is a vocal coach at the Bermuda School of Music, and also cares for her two-year-old twin nieces, Elizabeth and Grace Hetsberger.

“When people see me now, they think I just had some kids, because I go everywhere with them,” she said.

“I recently sang at a funeral. I got up with one strapped to the front and one strapped to the back and sang. It was a wonderful experience.”

• Miss Barnum has two albums: And Other Places and Live at Cafe De La Danse Paris. Watch her perform at the BNG on Friday and at the Earl Cameron Theatre on April 22. Both shows start at 7pm. General admission for the first show is $30; BNG members pay $20. Tickets for April’s show, which includes performances by Mitchell “Live Wires” Trott, Stephan Johnstone, MCP and Quinn Outerbridge, are $40 for BNG members and $50 for non-members. All tickets are available at the BNG. For more information e-mail director@bng.bm or call 295-9428.