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

   Highlights of the 2007-08 season included:

Nerone in Domenico Scarlatti’s Ottavia restituita al trono with the Cappella della Pietà de’ Turchini in San Sebastián; staged and concert performances of Bajazet with Fabio Biondi/Europa Galante in Venice, Krakow, Paris, Madrid and Metz; L’italiana in Algeri with Minnesota Opera; La Cenerentola with the Grand Théâtre de Genève; Rossini’s Bianca e Falliero with Washington Concert Opera; I Capuleti ed i Montecchi with the Pittsburgh Opera;

concerts with: l’Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse (Rossini arias); La Cetra (Istanbul and Basel); members of the Venice Baroque Orchestra (Angers); Festival appearances at Musique au Coeur d’Antibes (with countertenor Jacek Laszczowski) and the Caramoor Festival (Falla’s El amor brujo, in the original 1915 version); a recital at Versailles’ Chapelle Royale; and a French TV appearance on Eve Ruggieri’s “Musique au cœur 5 étoiles”.

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 five other companies, including the Opéra National de Paris and San Francisco Opera, 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 eighteen companies including the: Théâtre des Champs-Elysées, Semperoper, Opera Orchestra of New York (at Carnegie Hall), Santiago’s Teatro Municipal and New Israeli Opera.

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); Hassem in the Donizetti rarity Alahor in Granata (Granada); Pippo/La gazza ladra (Caramoor); Arsace/Semiramide and Romeo/I Capuleti (both for Minnesota Opera). 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: Bradamante/Alcina (Paris); Title Role/Ariodante (Dallas, San Diego); Polinesso/Ariodante (Paris/London/Madrid); Title Role/Arminio (Solothurn, Siena, Concertgebouw); 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); Teologia in A. Scarlatti’s La Santissima Trinità (Palermo, Lyon, Paris); and Orfeo in Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice (Los Angeles).

Included among her many notable concert and recital engagements have been: extensive tours with the Akademie für Alte Musik, Europa Galante, Les Talens Lyriques, Les Violons du Roy, La Cetra, and the Orchestre National de France; festival appearances in Prague, Lanaudière, Montpellier, San Remo, Antibes, Ravello and Caramoor; performances with the Münchner Kammerorchester, New York Chamber Symphony and New York Festival of Song; as well as engagements in her native Alaska (Anchorage, Fairbanks and Juneau), at the Wiener Konzerthaus, Teatro Real in Madrid, Barcelona’s Gran Teatre del Liceu, Herbst Theater in San Francisco and Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall.

Several future recording projects are planned as Ms. Genaux’s discography continues to grow steadily. Due on the market this season is the Biondi/Europa Galante Ercole sul Termodonte on Virgin Classics. Other recent CDs include the world premiere recording of Vivaldi’s L’Atenaide, with Federico Maria Sardelli leading the Orchestra Barocca Modo Antiqua on the Naïve label. Previously, Virgin Classics released: Handel/Hasse Arias and Cantatas (2006), with Bernard Labadie and Les Violons du Roy, which has received consistent kudos; the lavishly praised, Grammy©-nominated Biondi/Europa Galante Bajazet (2005); La Santissima Trinità (Biondi/Europa Galante) released in 2004; and, in 2003, her first solo disk 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 releases, both conducted by early mentor 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 widely 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).

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!"