Violetta Urmana (Soprano)
The Lithuanian-born singer is now recognised as one of the leading dramatic
sopranos in the Italian and German fach with roles such as Aida, Amelia,
Elisabetta, Gioconda, Leonora, Tosca, Norma, Sieglinde or Isolde.
First acknowledged as a mezzo-soprano, Violeta Urmana became world famous for
her interpretation of roles such as Kundry in Wagner's Parsifal and Eboli
in Verdi's Don Carlo. Besides many other parts, she sang these two roles
at nearly all important opera houses and with conductors like Claudio Abbado,
Daniel Barenboim, Bertrand de Billy, Pierre Boulez, Riccardo Chailly, James
Conlon, James Levine, Jesъs Lуpez Cobos, Fabio Luisi, Zubin Mehta, Riccardo
Muti, Sir Simon Rattle, Donald Runnicles, Giuseppe Sinopoli, Franz Welser-Mцst
and Christian Thielemann.
Following her debut in the part of Sieglinde in Wagner's Die Walkьre
at the 2001 Bayreuth Festival, her real soprano debut took place in December
2002 in the title role of Gluck's Iphigйnie en Aulide conducted by
Riccardo Muti to open the new season at Teatro alla Scala in Milan.
After that, she made several highly successful debuts as a soprano: Maddalena
in Giordano's Andrea Chйnier in Vienna, Lady Macbeth in Verdi's
Macbeth in Seville, Isolde in Wagner's Tristan und Isolde in Rome,
the title role of Ponchielli's La Gioconda and Leonora in Verdi's La
forza del destino in London and, in 2005, the title roles of Puccini's
Tosca in Florence, of Richard Strauss's Ariadne auf Naxos at the
New York Metropolitan Opera and of Catalani's La Wally at the Vienna
Konzerthaus. In 2006 she scored a huge success in her debuts as Bellini's
Norma in Dresden, as Elisabetta in Verdi's Don Carlo in Turin, as
Aida to open the 2006 season at La Scala in Milan and lately as Amelia in
Verdi's Un Ballo in Maschera in Florence. The part of Isolde has taken
Violeta Urmana into the highly dramatic territory of Wagner opera, and having
sung it repeatedly in concert performances, she made her fully-staged debut in
July 2008 in Japan, with the Opйra Bastille under the direction of Semyon
Bychkov. In December she sang her debut in the title role of Gluck’s
Iphigйnie en Tauride in Valencia. In 2010 she made her highly acclaimed
debut in the part of ‘Odabella’ in Verdi’s Attila conducted by Riccardo
Muti at the Met.
Among her plans are Tosca in Berlin, Madrid, Amsterdam and Vienna,
La Gioconda in Karlsruhe and Paris, Mahler‘s 8th symphony in
Turin, Rimini and Munich, Verdi‘s Requiem in Vienna,
Rьckert-Lieder in Moscow, St. Petersburg and at the Usedom Festival,
where she will also present a song recital, La Forza del Destino
in Paris, Vienna and Barcelona, Aida in New York, Cavalleria rusticana
in Paris, Gurre-Lieder in Vienna, Macbeth in Madrid,
Siegfried (in concert) in Berlin, Tristan und Isolde in Berlin,
Vienna and Paris, Parsifal and Don Carlo in Berlin.
As a concert and recital singer Violeta Urmana performs a wide repertoire
from Johann Sebastian Bach to Alban Berg in all the important music centres in
Europe, the USA and Japan. Her lieder recitals are musical events acclaimed by
press and public alike.
Violeta Urmana has recorded the title role of La Gioconda conducted by
Marcello Viotti, excepts from Tristan und Isolde and from
Gцtterdдmmerung conducted by Antonio Pappano, Azucena in Verdi's Il
Trovatore conducted by Riccardo Muti, Cuniza in Verdi's Oberto
conducted by Sir Neville Marriner, Beethoven's 9th Symphony conducted by
Claudio Abbado, Berlioz's La mort de Clйopвtre conducted by Bertrand de
Billy, Zemlinsky's Maeterlinck-Lieder and Stravinsky's Le
Rossignol conducted by James Conlon, Mahler's 2nd Symphony conducted by
Kazushi Ono and Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde and Rьckert-Lieder
conducted by Pierre Boulez. Verdi's Requiem with Violeta Urmana in the
soprano role, with Semyon Bychkov conducting the WDR Symphony Orchestra, was
released in July 2008. In September 2009 has been issued a Puccini album
together with Placido Domingo and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra by the
Deutsche Grammophon, titled "Puccini Rediscovered". In September 2010 there has
been released a Parsifal" recording with her as Kundry on the Mariinsky label.
She can be heard on numerous DVDs. The most recent of these are Aida
directed by Franco Zeffirelli under the musical direction of Ricardo Chailly for
the opening of the 2006/7 season at La Scala in Milan and Cavalleria
rusticana in a 2007 production by the Teatro Real in Madrid directed by
Giancarlo del Monaco and conducted by Jйsus Lуpez-Cobos. Her Aida from La
Scala in Milan and La forza del destino from the 2007 Maggio Musicale in
Florence and her latest production Un ballo in maschera at the Tйatro
Real Madrid.
Violeta Urmana plays the role of Kundry in Tony Palmer's film The Search
for the Holy Grail.
In 2002, in London, she received the prestigious Royal Philharmonic Society
Award for singers and in 2009 the Austrian "Kammersдngerin" award in
Vienna.
Web site of Violetta Urmana
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