A Juilliard-trained, four-time Tony Award-winning singer and actress who has released four solo albums and performed with every major orchestra in the US, Audra McDonald is not one to rest on her laurels – which also include two Grammy awards and two prime-time Emmy Award nominations. The vivacious actress is a restlessly creative spirit who is reluctant to be typecast strictly as a musical theater artist, despite her enormous success in that genre. Since her last UMS appearance in 2005, McDonald has made her Houston Grand Opera debut, won her fourth Tony (for A Raisin in the Sun), played Olivia in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night at The Public Theater’s Shakespeare in the Park, performed at the White House for President Obama, and spent four years on the ABC series “Private Practice.” She now returns to her musical theater roots, including both this Hill Auditorium concert and performing the role of Bess in Porgy and Bess for American Repertory Theater and on Broadway.