Elīna Garanča

Elīna Garanča (born 16 September 1976) is a Latvian operatic mezzo-soprano. With a musical family background, she began to study singing in her hometown of Riga in 1996 and continued her studies in Vienna and in the United States. By 1999 she had won First Place in a significant competition in Finland and had begun a career in Europe. Worldwide engagements quickly followed her 2003 Salzburg Festival appearances.

Early life and education

Elīna Garanča was born in the Latvian city of Riga into a musical family: her father was a choral director, and her mother Anita was a lieder singer,[1][2][3] a professor at the Latvian Academy of Music, an associate professor at the Latvian Academy of Culture, a vocal music teacher at the Latvian National Opera, and also a private voice tutor.[4][5] Her brother Jānis (sometimes spelled Jaanis) Garančs, three years older than Elīna, started out in music studies, but is now an artist and consultant working with interactive computer-generated visual media.[6]

Career in opera

She entered the Latvian Academy of Music in 1996 to study singing with Sergej Martinov. She continued her studies in Vienna with Irina Gavrilovici and in the United States with Virginia Zeani. Garanča began her professional career at the Südthüringisches Staatstheater in Meiningen and later worked at the Frankfurt Opera. In 1999, she won the Mirjam Helin Singing Competition in Helsinki, Finland.

Garanča's international breakthrough came in 2003 at the Salzburger Festspiele when she sang Annio in a production of Mozart's La clemenza di Tito, conducted by Nikolaus Harnoncourt. Major engagements followed quickly, such as Charlotte in Werther, Dorabella in Così fan tutte at the Vienna State Opera (2004) and Dorabella in a Paris production directed by Patrice Chéreau (2005). In 2006, she returned to La clemenza di Tito, this time singing the part of Sesto. On 12 January 2008 Garanča made her company and house debut at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, in the role of Rosina in Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia.[7] Of her debut, Bernard Holland wrote in The New York Times: "Ms. Garanca is the real thing ... Modern singing techniques adapt with difficulty to Rossini's early-19th-century emphasis on speed, lightness and athletic articulation, and Ms. Garanca was the only one onstage sounding completely comfortable. The lyric passages sang out; the episodes of racecourse delivery were fully in hand".[8] Garanča sang the leading role of Georges Bizet's Carmen in the 2010 production of the Metropolitan Opera. In the opening concert of the 2011 Rheingau Musik Festival in the Eberbach Abbey she performed Alban Berg's Sieben frühe Lieder with the hr-Sinfonieorchester, conducted by Paavo Järvi.[9]

Garanča: "To me it’s not professional to go onstage and burn up,” she said. “My first goal is to present my voice. To this, I add—in no particular order—expression, character, emotion. But first of all it’s about the voice. I’m a singer after all. Otherwise I would have been an actress."[10]

Awards

Repertoire

Garanca's repertoire includes:[5][21]

Year (debut) Composer Opera Role(s) Location
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart La clemenza di Tito Annio
Pietro Mascagni Cavalleria rusticana Lola
Pietro Mascagni Cavalleria rusticana Santuzza
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Le nozze di Figaro Cherubino
Richard Strauss Der Rosenkavalier Octavian
Jules Massenet Werther Charlotte
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Così fan tutte Dorabella
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart La clemenza di Tito Sesto
Gioachino Rossini The Barber of Seville Rosina
Gioachino Rossini La Cenerentola Angelina
Georges Bizet Carmen Carmen
Vincenzo Bellini I Capuleti e i Montecchi Romeo
2011 Gaetano Donizetti Anna Bolena Giovanna Seymour Wiener Staatsoper
2016 Gaetano Donizetti Roberto Devereux Sara Metropolitan Opera
Gaetano Donizetti La favorite Léonor de Guzman
Hector Berlioz Les Troyens Didon
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Don Giovanni Donna Elvira
Jules Massenet La Navarraise Anita
Johann Strauss Die Fledermaus Orlofsky
Jacques Offenbach Contes d'Hoffmann Nicklausse
Vincenzo Bellini Norma Adalgisa
Giuseppe Verdi Falstaff Meg Page
Hector Berlioz La damnation de Faust Marguerite

Recordings

Her recordings include the Grammy Award winning Bajazet conducted by Fabio Biondi, in which she sang the role of Andronico. In 2005 Garanča signed an exclusive contract with Deutsche Grammophon.

Other audio recordings include:

DVD recordings include:

Personal life

Garanča is married to the conductor Karel Mark Chichon, and they have two daughters.[23]

Bibliography

References

  1. ↑ Gurewitsch, Matthew (June 28, 2009). "A Mezzo Kicks Up Her Heels in High Style". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 2013-06-24. Retrieved 2010-06-27.
  2. ↑ Loomis, George (January 10, 2008). "Opera's Switch Hitter". The New York Sun. Archived from the original on 2016-06-08. Retrieved 2016-06-08.
  3. ↑ "Elina Garanca – Biography". Deutsche Grammophon. Archived from the original on 2016-06-08. Retrieved 2016-06-08.
  4. ↑ Kuusisaari, Harri (July 22, 2009). "Latvian blonde is eager to alter her image". The Mirjam Helin International Singing Competition. Finnish Cultural Foundation. Archived from the original on 2012-04-26.
  5. 1 2 "Anita Garanča's website". Archived from the original on 2016-06-08. Retrieved 2016-06-08.
  6. ↑ "Jaanis Garancs". www.garancs.net. Archived from the original on 2016-03-19.
  7. ↑ "Rossini's Il Barbiere di Siviglia". BBC. 26 January 2008. Archived from the original on 2008-01-29. Retrieved 2014-03-18.
  8. ↑ Holland, Bernard (January 14, 2008). "Barreling Through Rossini With a ‘Noises Off’ Rhythm". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 2013-12-18. Retrieved 2008-01-14.
  9. ↑ Klaus Ackermann (27 June 2011). "Magische Momente" (in German). op-online.de. Archived from the original on 2016-06-08. Retrieved 2016-06-08.
  10. ↑ Matthew Gurewitsch (26 June 2009). "A Mezzo Kicks Up Her Heels in High Style". The New York Times. Retrieved 2016-06-21.
  11. ↑ Veikko Ylikojola. "Where are they now? Previous winners". Mirjam Helin International Singing Competition. Archived from the original on 2016-06-08. Retrieved 2016-06-08.
  12. ↑ "Latvia: Elina Garanca". BBC Cardiff Singer of the World. 1 July 2001. Archived from the original on 2011-06-22. Retrieved 2016-06-08.
  13. ↑ Aaron Green. "48th Annual Grammy Awards: Classical Music". About.com. Retrieved 2016-06-08.
  14. ↑ "Alle Preisträger" (in German). Die Europäische Kulturstiftung Pro Europa. Archived from the original on 2016-06-08. Retrieved 2016-06-08.
  15. 1 2 3 "Opera star Elina Garanca wins award for "Romantique"". The Baltic Course. 27 August 2013. Archived from the original on 2016-06-08. Retrieved 2016-06-08.
  16. ↑ "Magazine "Musical America" names Elīna Garanča Vocalist of the Year". Bestriga. 16 November 2009. Archived from the original on 2016-06-08. Retrieved 2016-06-08.
  17. ↑ "Elīna Garanča gewinnt MIDEM Classical Award" (in German). KlassiKAkzente. 25 November 2009. Archived from the original on 2016-06-08. Retrieved 2016-06-08.
  18. ↑ "Verleihung des Titels "Österreichische Kammersängerin" an Elina Garanca" (in German). KlassiKAkzente. 23 May 2013. Archived from the original on 2016-06-08. Retrieved 2016-06-08.
  19. ↑ "Solo Recording of the Year/Voice (Duets/opera arias)". Echo Klassik. Archived from the original on 2013-08-19.
  20. ↑ "Echo Klassik – Preisträger 2015". Echo Klassik. Archived from the original on 2015-09-09.
  21. ↑ "Elina Garanca". Wiener Staatsoper. Archived from the original on 2016-06-08. Retrieved 2016-06-08.
  22. ↑ Rupert Christiansen (26 September 2012). "Elina Garanca: We mezzos get to have such fun". The Telegraph. Archived from the original on 2016-06-08. Retrieved 2016-06-08. Christiansen states "on the showing she makes in her new album, Romantique, I would go further and claim that in her repertory, there has been no one to touch her since the Olga Borodina of 20 years ago."
  23. ↑ "Elina Garanča: a singer is like a sportsman". LRT. 20 May 2015. Archived from the original on 2016-06-08. Retrieved 2016-06-08.
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