VIVICA GENAUX, mezzo-soprano

"...the leading baroque
and bel canto interpreter
of her generation..."

"not only
soars above the orchestra
but seems to surpass nature
in her interpretation
of the nightingale!"

The music you're hearing is one of the arias excerpted in "A Voice Out Of The Cold" - an exciting, new video documentary on Vivica Genaux, available on DVD exclusively on FanFaire.com

Career Highlights / Past Seasons

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   Among the highlights of her 2009-10 season were engagements in:

Cenerentola (Stresa Festival, Théâtre des Champs-Elysées and Washington Concert Opera); Tancredi (Vienna and Budapest) led by René Jacobs; Haydn’s Il mondo della luna (Vienna) under Nikolaus Harnoncourt; Semele with Les Talens Lyriques and Christophe Rousset (Théâtre des Champs-Elysées and the Barbican); the Hasse rarity Piramo e Tisbe (Salzburg Whitsun Festival and Montpellier) with Fabio Biondi and Europa Galante; concerts with the same conductor and ensemble in Paris, Strasbourg, Turin, Naples and Cracow; further orchestral appearances at the Palais Garnier, in Hamburg and Udine, the televised special “Les Victoires de la Musique”, as well as recitals in Santiago de Compostela and Chicago.

Ms. Genaux’s professional stage debut was with the Florentine Opera in October 1994 as Isabella in L’italiana. She subsequently sang the role with numerous companies, including the Opéra National de Paris, San Francisco Opera and Turin’s Teatro Regio, among others. Rosina/Il barbiere di Siviglia is her most performed role, having sung it with twenty-one companies including: the Wiener, Deutsche and Bayerische Staatsopers; Metropolitan, De Nederlandse, Washington National and Dallas Operas; and at the Dresden Festival. She has played Angelina/Cenerentola with twenty-two companies including the: Semperoper, Opera Orchestra of New York (at Carnegie Hall), Santiago’s Teatro Municipal, New Israeli Opera, the Japan Opera Foundation, and the Grand Théâtre de Genève. Among her other bel canto credentials are the trouser parts of: Neocle/ L’assedio di Corinto (Baltimore); Malcolm/La donna del lago (Caramoor); Orsini/Lucrezia Borgia (Caramoor/Minnesota Opera); Falliero in Bianca e Falliero (Washington Concert Opera); Hassem in Donizetti’s Alahor in Granata (Seville); Pippo/La gazza ladra (Caramoor); Arsace/ Semiramide (Minnesota & Caramoor) and Romeo/I Capuleti ed i Montecchi (Minnesota/ Pittsburgh). In the Baroque and early-Classical repertoires her Handel roles are the most varied and numerous, encompassing everything from fearless generals to ruthless goddesses, from impetuous young men to love-sick maidens disguised in male attire, from caped Crusaders to the most nefarious of villains and finally to allegorical visions: Il Piacere/Il Trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno (Madrid); Bradamante/Alcina (Paris); Title Role/Ariodante (Dallas/San Diego); Polinesso/Ariodante (Paris/London/Madrid/Vienna); Title Role/Arminio (Solothurn/Siena/ Amsterdam); Title Role/Giulio Cesare (Washington); Sesto/Giulio Cesare (San Diego); the dual roles of Juno and Ino/Semele (New York City Opera); and the Title Role/Rinaldo (Montpellier/ Innsbruck). She has also labored lovingly to help widen the appreciation for the works of Hasse, both in her many concerts and on stage: Marc’Antonio/ Marc’Antonio e Cleopatra (Paris/Brussels) and Selimo/Solimano (Berlin/ Dresden). Additionally, she has made a strong impact as: Penelope/Il ritorno d’Ulisse (Munich – three engagements); Title Role/ Vivaldi’s Giustino (Solothurn); Irene/ Bajazet (Vienna/Yokohama/Montpellier/Venice/Cracow/Paris/Madrid/ Metz); Antiope/Ercole sul Termodonte (Cracow/Vienna/Paris); Teologia in Alessandro Scarlatti’s La Santissima Trinità (Palermo/Lyon/Paris); Nerone in Domenico Scarlatti’s Ottavia restituita al trono (San Sebastián); Orfeo in Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice (Los Angeles); and Costanza in Haydn’s L’isola disabitata (Bamberg).

Included among her many notable past concert and recital engagements have been those with: the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, La Cetra, Collegium Apollineum, Il Complesso Barocco, Concentus Musicus Wien, Concerto Italiano, Concerto Köln, Europa Galante, Freiburger Barockorchester, Les Paladins, Les Talens Lyriques, Venice Baroque Orchestra, Les Violons du Roy, Orchestre National de France, Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse and at the BBC Proms; festival appearances in: Rome, Prague, Ludwigsburg, St. Denis, Lanaudière, Montpellier, San Remo, Antibes, Ravello and Caramoor; performances with: the Münchner Kammerorchester, New York Chamber Symphony, Orchestra of St. Luke’s, New York Festival of Song, in her native Alaska (Anchorage, Fairbanks and Juneau), at the Wiener Konzerthaus, Moscow’s Tchaikovsky Concert Hall, Teatro Real in Madrid, Barcelona’s Gran Teatre del Liceu, on a South American tour (São Paulo/Rio de Janeiro/Montevideo and Buenos Aires), Herbst Theater in San Francisco and Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall, as well as on French TV on Eve Ruggieri’s “Musique au cœur 5 étoiles”.

Several future recording projects are planned as Ms. Genaux’s discography/videography continues to grow steadily. Due on the market this season is a DVD of the Vienna production of Il mondo della luna led by Nikolaus Harnoncourt on the Unitel Classica/C Major label. In 2011 Virgin Classics is expected to release Vivaldi’s Ercole sul Termodonte with Fabio Biondi/Europa Galante. “Pyrotechnics – Vivaldi Opera Arias” (Virgin) became available in 2009 with the same musical forces. (It was awarded the 2010 Echo Klassik prize in the category of “Opera Recording: Opera Arias,” marking the mezzo’s second such Echo award, previously bestowed in 2006 for Bajazet.) Among other recently released CDs are the world-premiere recording of Vivaldi’s L’Atenaide, with Federico Maria Sardelli leading the Orchestra Barocca Modo Antiqua on the Naïve label, as well as Virgin Classics’ “Handel/Hasse,” Arias and Cantatas (2006), with Bernard Labadie and Les Violons du Roy, which has received consistent praise; the lavishly lauded, Grammy©-nominated Biondi/Europa Galante Bajazet (2005); La Santissima Trinità (Biondi/Europa Galante) released in 2004; and, in 2003, her first solo disc on the label, “Bel Canto Arias”, featuring works by Rossini and Donizetti, with John Nelson conducting the Ensemble Orchestral de Paris. Harmonia Mundi produced two Baroque recordings, both conducted by René Jacobs, which have garnered copious critical and popular accolades: Handel’s Rinaldo, in 2003 and the Grammy©-nominated “Arias for Farinelli” in 2002. Arminio, recorded live in 2001, released on Virgin Classics, led by Alan Curtis, won the 2002 International Handel Prize. Other live recordings include: Alahor in Granata on the Almaviva label; “Rossiniana,” released by Agora with the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano Giuseppe Verdi; and “An Evening of Arias and Songs by Gioacchino Rossini,” with accompanist Martin Dubé. A documentary, “A Voice out of the Cold,” has been seen on television world-wide. “Fracture,” her first film, in which she made a cameo appearance, was released internationally in the Spring of 2007 and is now available on DVD.

In May 2008 Pittsburgh Opera honored Ms. Genaux with their Maecenas Award and the previous year she garnered the New York City Opera’s Christopher Keene Award. She is also the recipient of other distinctions: the Premio “Opera CD Classics – Città di Mondovi” and the Florentine Opera’s Marie Z. Uihlein Artist Prize. She has also been recognized by several other musical organizations, including the Fort Worth, Baltimore and Palm Beach Operas. In 1997 she won a prestigious ARIA Award, and was lauded as the “1999 Artist of the Year” by the Dresden Music Festival. She makes her home in Motta di Livenza and studies with Claudia Pinza, continuing her long-time association with EPCASO (Ezio Pinza Council of American Singers of Opera).

VIEW a VIDEO CLIP from VIVICA's PYROTECHNICS EMI RECORDING SESSION


Click on and learn more about this fast rising opera star hailed as "the preeminent Rossini interpreter of the new generation," a singer "naturally suited to the baroque and bel canto styles, with a voice that has in it both the duskiness of twilight and the freshness of morning!"

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