Saturday Offer Only!

Enjoy a night of world class music-making at the Opening Concert of the London Master Classes, in tribute to Philip Langridge. For one day only all those who book by phone or email can purchase half price tickets (£ 12, 50 instead of £ 25). Call today on 020 8346 7088 or email at: ns@londonmasterclasses.com to enjoy the offer.

http://www.londonmasterclasses.com

A day to Celebrate

Today, two very important people in Nelly's life are celebrating their birthday.

The first one is none other than Maria Tudosa, Nelly's mother, a wonderful artist and human being who has inspired Nelly in her career as an opera singer. Like we've mentioned in previous posts, Maria herself was a singer who later on dedicated herself to painting and poetry.

The second person in Nelly's life to celebrate his birthday today is David Harper, noted accompanist, vocal coach and cherished friend. Their collaboration started shortly after Nelly settled in England and continues to the day and together they have given historic recitals.

La multi ani draga noastra Cella, happy birthday David!

Below a video of Nelly and David during a concert in Amsterdam in 1996

New Nelly Miricioiu Page on Facebook

Click here to become a fan!

London Master Classes Update

Norma Saipe, the organiser of the London Master Classes has informed us that tenor Ian Partridge will also be taking part together with other LMC Associates in the opening concert In Memory of Philip Langridge. More updates and details to follow.

A unique memory and performance

Every performance is memorable for an artist but sometimes something happens and it makes the performance and the memory of it unique. This was the case last year when during the second act of her second performance as Tosca last year at Royal Opera House, Nelly wore jewellery that belonged to Princess Grace Kelly worth £3m.

London Master Classes and a unique concert in memoriam Phillip Landridge

London Master Classes is an organisation devoted to promoting classical music courses offering public masterclasses with leading performers working with advanced classical music students and young professionals before audiences in major London venues.

Founded in 1988 it attracted a great number of distinguished conductors, singers and instrumentalists such as Sena Jurinac, Philip Langridge, Ileana Cotrubas, Giuseppe di Stefano, Norma Fisher, Sergei Leiferkus, Sherrill Milnes, Ralph Kirshbaum, Rosalind Plowright and of course Nelly Miricioiu, who has been a a fervent supporter of this project and has given several masterclasses since 2000.

This year Nelly will continue her support for the organisation by taking part on 4 July, in the opening concert of the masterclasses, a concert organised in memory of Philip Langridge and in aid of London Master Classes Bursary Fund. The concert will feature a stellar cast: Nelly Miricioiu -soprano, Rosalind Plowright - mezzosoprano, Norma Fisher - piano, Sir John Tomlinson -bass, Raloh Kirshbaum - cello

For further info about the masterclasses, teachers and participants please go to the London Master Classes official website. Meanwhile we will come back with more details and the concert programme.

Two Romanians on the same page

The Times have published an interview with Antonio Pappano, the Royal Opera House Music Director to preview his BBC series on Italian Opera. The article featured Pappano's top 10 Italian Operas and Nelly was pictured as the representative Norma whilst Romanian baritone George Petean was the Figaro of choice.

Adriana in Timisoara impresses bloggers and fans

A wonderful article published on the Romanian blog, Operaonline after Nelly's performance as Adriana Lecouvreur in Timisoara.

Click here to read the article as well as the fans reactions; and speaking of the Timisoara performance a video recording should be arriving soon.

Up close and personal Nelly Miricioiu

The online Italian opera magazine GB Opera have published an interview with Nelly for their Senza trucco series. The interview consists of 50 questions, which each featured artist is asked to answer. Nelly has enjoyed tremendously slightly unorthodox but very interesting and funny questions. Hope you will as well!

Click here for the interview.

Adriana Lecouvreur backstage and afterparty

Thank you Daniela for the wonderful pictures

A night at the opera..

This wasn't an uneventful "Adriana"...first we had a volcano keeping Nelly from getting to Romania on time, then Marianne flying in between performances, what tremendous effort, but they did it. They wowed the Timisoara crowd during an unforgetful night at the opera.
More reactions and pictures to follow!

In Bocca al lupo!

Marianne Cornetti will sing tonight, for the first time in Covent Garden, one of her signature roles Amneris, in Verdi's Aida. This is a mighty occasion, as it is also a brand new production of David McVicar, l'enfant terrible of opera stagings.
Marianne will take on the impetous role of Amneris for all six dates and will fly to Timisoara in between for her performance as Princess de Bouillon on the 29th.
(Below a picture of Marianne in a much more tame production of Aida)

Coming back home...

spot Nelly....

Adriana Lecouvreur - Full Cast

Conductor: DAVID CRESCENZI Adriana Lecouvreur: NELLY MIRCIOIU Princess of Buillon: MARIANNE CORNETTI Maurizio: CALIN BRATESCU Michonet: DAN PATACA Prince of Buillon: OCTAVIAN VLAICU Abbe:CRISTIAN BALASESCU Quinault: IULIAN IOAN IOSIP Poisson/Major-Domo: MARIUS ZAHARIA Jouvenot: MARIANA SARBA Dangeville: RAMONA ZAHARIA

Adriana Lecouvreur in Timisoara

Nelly will reprise her role as Adriana Lecouvreur on March 29 at the National Opera House in Timisoara, Romania. After her triumphant debut in 2000 at La Scala, Adriana has become one of Nelly's signature roles and she continued to perform it to great acclaim in Rome, London, Amsterdam and Bucharest. Last year, after the triumph in the role of Adriana, Tim Ashley wrote for The Guardian: "it would be difficult to imagine a greater Adriana than Miricioiu, who sang like a goddess and relentlessly probed the psyche of a woman who believes herself to be "the handmaid of creative genius" but whose artistry is dependent on her own unacknowledged emotional volatility. We believed in the artistry, too: some Adrianas are fazed by Racine, though Miricioiu performed him like one born to it."

More pictures from Amsterdam...

courtesy of our very dear Jean-Yves Grandin.

Happy Birthday Magda Olivero!

Today the wonderful Magda Olivero turns 100 years.
A century of beauty, music and art.

NEW! Pictures from Concertgebouw

taken on Saturday by Frits de Ruiter during and after the Caterina Cornaro perfomance.

And for all those of you who haven't managed to listen to the live broadcast, there is a recording, temporary available, on the Radio 4 Netherlands website. Click here for the link.

A wonderful and heartfelt profile on Nelly

published by Joey Newsome, author and owner of Voix des arts blog, which you can read if you click here.

Live Broadcast of Caterina Cornaro on Radio 4 Netherlands

As mentioned previously, tomorrow's performance of Caterina Cornaro will be broadcasted live by Radio 4 Netherlands at 1 pm CET. For full details click here.

Below a ducth article published about this event, published in VPRO Guide.

New! Video extracts from La Traviata peformance

A video extract of the La Traviata peformance with Chelsea Opera Group, from 13 February 2010. Nelly and Alan Opie sing the second act duet between Germont Sr and Violetta Valery.

The beginning of a beautiful relationship

25 years ago Nelly was appearing for the first time in Amsterdam with the Saturday Radio Matinee (once called VARA) for a concert performance of Mefistofele and one year later history was made when they sent her a new score for the following performance. Nelly looked at it and thought, "my God so many notes"..it was the score of Armida by Rossini which marked not only the beginning of the famous Nelly Miricioiu VARA Matinee concerts but also a whole new repertoire for Nelly, that later would become her trademark.
She then went on to sing Anna Bolena, Maria Sturda, Roberto Devereux, Norma, Tancredi, Semiramide, Il Pirata and also versimo roles like Francesca di Rimini and Iris. She had tremendous successes with Ernani and Le Vespres Siciliennes (in french) and in 2006 she sang Adriana Lecouvreur with Marianne Cornetti and the late Sergej Larin.
To mark this special anniversary she returns tomorrow, Saturday, 20 March for a concert performance of the rarely heard Caterina Cornaro by Gaetano Donizetti. Joining her are Dario Schmunck as Gerardo and Nicola Alaimo as Lusignano and David Perry conducting.
The cast will also include Mirco Palazzi, Károly Szemerédy, Peter Gijsbertsen. This performance will be recorded for a radio broadcast.
Below a fragment of the historic performance of Armida in Amsterdam.

Art runs in the family

A little while ago we all gathered at the Spiro Ark Centre in the heart of London, where the wonderful Maria Tudosa exhibited a series of paintings inspired by the Holocaust and Jewish sufferings. To honour her and this event, Maria's daughter, none other than Nelly Miricioiu, gave a moving recital for all those present together with one of her students Tal Katisr.
Nelly and her mother are bonded not only by blood but also by their love and deep involvement with art. After all, Maria named her daughter after the legendary soprano Nellie Melba, whose biography she was reading whilst pregnant. Although Maria started off as an actress, she later discovered her passion for singing and began training as a soprano joining one of the most prestigious Romanian musical institutions, the George Enescu Philharmonic in Iasi, Romania.
A multidimesional artist, she continued assidously to expand her horizons by dedicating herself to ballet, poetry and painting, but it was in the latter where she could find the true expression of her artistic and spiritual nature.
A fervent opposer of the Romanian communist regime her art is strongly influenced by the fight against totalitarianism as well as her passion for mysticism, spirtuality and fantastic surrealism.
Maria has exhibited her work in both her native Romania and abroad, including at the Royal Academy of Art.
The exhibition closes on 9 April and for more details please click here. Maria Tudosa's full biography can be found here.

"The event of the week for me, however, was undoubtedly the Chelsea Opera Group’s concert performance at Queen Elizabeth Hall of Verdi’s La Traviata. Gianluca Marciano conducted a splendidly paced account, and Cosmin Ifrim as Alfredo, and Alan Opie as his father, sang robustly and captivatingly. Nelly Miricioiu seemed to bring a lifetime’s experience, aptly enough, to the role of Violetta, but her vocal instrument was in impeccable form. Right to that all-important single-note affirmative dying cry, she was well-nigh transcendent."

Paul Driver for The Sunday Times

Another review on Classical Source

To read it click here


UPDATE: Jill Segal has also reviewed Nelly's performance for Bachtrack. To find out what she had to say click here

Dominic McHugh reviews La Traviata

Click here to read the La Traviata full review of Dominic McHugh on Musical Criticism

Nelly returns to Chelsea Opera Group

Nelly will return to Queen Elisabeth Hall together with Chelsea Opera Group for a performance of Donizetti's Belisario, next year on February 13. This will mark her return to bel canto with COG after her 2007 appearance in Beatrice di Tenda.
Throughout her career, Nelly has dedicated herself to the revival of less performed operas and she has a long collaboration history with Opera Rara with who she recorded numerous bel canto masterpieces. In that tradition, she chose Donizetti's Caterina Coronaro as her annivesary performance this year of the VARA a Matinee Concerts at the Amsterdam Concertgebouw.
An opera in 3 acts, Belisario was premiered to great acclaim on February 4, 1836 at Teatro La Fenice, Venice and although it was very popular through out the 19th century, modern productions are very rare.

Changes to the schedule!

The performance of Adriana Lecouvreuer on the 28th April in Timisoara, Romania has now been rescheduled for 30th April 2010, whilst the Master Class, 1-9 May, has been cancelled.

Exclusive Traviata reactions!

Despite suffering from a head cold that put her appearance under threat Nelly Miricioiu still managed to wow the crowd and get a standing ovation, last night at La Traviata performance with Chelsea Opera Group at Queen Elisabeth Hall, London.

Violetta on my mind..

Two days left until Nelly's return as Violetta in La Traviata, a role that she adores but hasn't performed since 1991. We have dedicated a lot of posts to this event and whilst we wait until Sunday, take a look below at a collage of pictures of Nelly in Verdi's most loved opera.

Act 2, the real tear jerker?

Some have already gone through a couple of handkerchiefs and napkins by the time act 3 settles in. That duet between Violetta and Germont Sr. brings out the infamous Verdi pathesim and some string tunes to die for.

Begging for mercy both Nelly Miricioiu and Sergei Leiferkus give a stellar rendition of the duet in this concert performance:

Another Romanian interview

One of the most popular newspapers in Romania has featured Nelly in an article called Unknown at home, adored by foreigners, where Nelly gave a short count of her life during the communist regime, her family, her career, her friendship with Marianne Cornetti and her everlasting wish, to sing more in Romania.

Again, this one is for our Romanian followers or those who have access to some good web translators.

Click here for the article.

And one other thing....

Singing Annina, in the same La Traviata production, is the young soprano Joanne Roughton-Arnold. Joanne is Nelly's student and has recently performed among others Norina in Don Pasquale and Euridice in Gluck's Orfeo and Euridice with Morley Opera and has in her repertoire roles like Ariel in The Tempest, The Queen of the Night, Fiordiligi and the fiendish Zerbinetta in Adriane auf Naxos.

"Miricioiu demonstrated how arias of Bellini and Rossini should be sung..."

.... according to the noted Dutch critic Peter van der Lint after Nelly's appearance at the end of January in Eindhoven, Netherlands at the Storioni Festival. No further comment needed!

La Traviata Complete Cast

Verdi: LA TRAVIATA [Concert Version]

London, South Bank Center, Queen Elizabeth Hall

21 February 2010

Conductor Gianluca Marcianò
Leader Diana Cummings
Chorus Master Deborah Miles Johnson
Violetta Nelly Miricioiu
Alfredo Germont Cosmin Ifrim
Giorgio Germont Alan Opie
Flora Anne-Marie Gibbons
Annina Joanne Roughton
Gastone Thomas Herford
Baron Riccardo Simonetti
Marchese Matthew Stiff
Dr Grenvil John Morrissey
Giuseppe Paul Curievici
Commisioner Matthew Sprange

Nelly's interviews score highly on Musical Criticism

As most of you might know, last year Nelly was interviewed twice by Dominic McHugh the editor and founder of MusicalCriticism.com The wonderful news, came again from Dominic who told us that the interviews with Renee Fleming, Roberto Alagna, Elina Garanča and Nelly Miricioiu were the most popular among the online publication's readers.
In case you've missed it, click here and here to find out about Nelly's take on singing, life, art ..well...almost everything.

The two Germonts: Alan Opie and Cosmin Ifrim

There has been a lot of mystery around who will partner Nelly in the upcoming production of La Traviata with Chelsea Opera Group on Sunday, 21 February, but once the cast was announced everyone knew it was worth the wait. So joining Nelly are:


Alfredo Germont -Cosmin Ifrim

Giorgio Germont - Alan Opie

Alan Opie

Baritone Alan Opie is a regular guest at the Metropolitan Opera New York, La Scala, Wiener Staatsoper, Bayerische Staatsoper Munich, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Santa Fe Festival, Glyndebourne Festival Opera, English National Opera and Royal Opera House Covent Garden. At ENO he was nominated for the ‘Outstanding Achievement in Opera’ Olivier Award for his performance of Falstaff.

His most recent performances include Madama Butterfly with the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden; Candide with Teatro San Carlo in Naples; Falstaff with l’Opéra du Rhin and at the Washington National Opera; Rigoletto with Opera North and Opera Company of Philadelphia; and Tosca with Canadian Opera Company in Toronto.

His extensive concert work has included performances of Mendelssohn’s Elijah in San Francisco and Dallas; Walton’s Belshazzar’s Feast in Dallas and Carnegie Hall; Britten’s War Requiem in Washington, Vaughan Williams’s Sea Symphony in Los Angeles, Elgar’s The Kingdom with the Halle Orchestra in honor of the 150th anniversary of Elgar’s birth and Apostles as part of the BBC Proms 2007 season.

Alan Opie has recorded for CBS, EMI, Hyperion, Chandos, and Decca. Releases include ‘Alan Opie Sings Bel Canto Arias,’ Britten’s Gloriana, Albert Herring, Peter Grimes for which he received a Grammy Award, Death in Venice and The Rape of Lucretia; the title role in Dallapiccola’s Ulisse; Tonio in I Pagliacci; Enrico in Lucia di Lammermoor; the role of Smirnov in Walton’s The Bear, Ernani, Il Trovatore, the title role in Il Barbiere di Siviglia and Beckmesser in Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg under Sir Georg Solti for which he received his second Grammy Award.

Recent appearances have included the leading role in the world premiere of Michael Berkeley’s opera For You at the Linbury Theatre, Covent Garden and on tour in the U.K., and his return to La Scala as Kolenaty in The Makropoulos Case.




Cosmin Ifrim

After having been a member of the Vienna State Opera for 8 years, Cosmin Ifrim has started his career as a freelance artist during the 2008/2009 season. In November 2008 he sang Alfredo in La Traviata for a new production by Hugo de Ana in Maribor and in May 2009 he sang for the first time Tonio in La Fille du régiment in Bilbao.During Summer 2009 he sang again La Fille du régiment for the Klosterneuburg Festival and for the first time Duca in Rigoletto for the St Margarethen Festival.

Engagements in 2009/2010 include Billy Bud in Bilbao, Gualtiero in Bellini's Il Pirata for the National Opera in Athens and a new production of Die Entfürung aus dem Serail at the Volksoper in June 2010 and again Il Pirata in Basel.

During fall 2010 he will be returning to Bilbao as Little Bat for the new production of Floyd's Susannah and to Vienna for Die Entfürung aus dem Serail. His debut at the Liceu in Barcelona is planned for spring 2012 in the title role of Zemlinksy's Der Zwerg.

Born in Ineu/Arad he studied at the Music academy in Cluj-Napoca singing and conducting. After winning many important competitions he was engaged to the Vienna State Opera in 2000 where he first sang Lord Cecil within a new production of Donizetti's Roberto Devereux with Edita Gruberova. He quickly advanced to important and demanding roles like Rinuccio in Puccini's Gianni Schicchi, the Italian Tenor in Strauss' Der Rosenkavalier, the fisher in Rossini's Guillaume Tell or Beppe in Leoncavallo's Pagliacci. For his portrayal of Squeak in Britten's Billy Budd he was awarded with the Eberhard Wächter medal. His major breakthrough at the Vienna State Opera was the premiere of Giuseppe Verdi's Faslstaff in 2003 in which he sang the role of Fenton. The same part he already interpreted within a touring production in all the major cities of Netherlands. During the first years of his career he also appeared at the Italian Tenor at the State Opera Berlin, as Alfredo in Verdi's La Traviata in Mostar as well in Strauss' Salome and as Rosillion in Lehár's The Merry Widow in Tel Aviv.

His concert repertoire includes Orff's Carmina Burana, Rossini's Petite Messe Solennelle and Stabat Mater and Mendelsohn's Lauda Sion.

Among the important conductors he has worked with so far are Richard Hickox, Zubin Mehta, Fabio Luisi, Riccardo Mutti, Seiji Ozawa, Donald Runnicles, Ulf Schirmer,Vjekoslav Sutej, Christian Thielemann, Franz Welser-Möst and Marcello Viotti.

a Romanian interview

There is a new interview with Nelly for her Romanian fans on Operaonline.ro

Operaonline is the Romanian answer to Operachic or Intermezzo and Nelly thoroughly enjoyed answering her questions as well as browsing through her blog which for all of you Romanian opera lovers out there is a must.

To read the interview click here.


Romanian language knowledge or a Google/personal translator are a must!

Adriana in Timisoara with Marianne

Nelly and Marianne Cornetti are confirmed to sing Adriana Lecouvreur in Timisoara, Romania in April this year and it will be for the first time they will perform together in Romania although Marianne has visited Romania with Nelly on numerous occasions.

Here are some fun facts for you:

Although they have been best friends for a long time Marianne and Nelly will play the sworn rivals Adriana Lecouvreur and Principessa de Bouillon, bringing all the guns out for the love of Maurizio

After some fiery vocal displays in the second and third act, the princess is the one who kills Adriana by sending her a bouquet of poisoned flowers (the real Adriane Lecouvreur actually managed to survive an assassination attempt which involved poisoned cookies and died of dysentery in the arms of Voltaire).

Marianne and Nelly became friends during a 2002 Adriana Lecouvreur performance in Rome (see the picture, Nelly, Marianne ,Salvatore Licitra and Daniel Oren)

This is one of Nelly's favourite roles. She debuted it in 2000 at La Scala and sung it since then on numerous occasions to great acclaim.

Nelly in Netherlands

Nelly loves Netherlands. She adores singing there and meeting her Dutch fans and she performs there very often, a couple of times a year. This month she has been invited to perform during the Storioni Festival in Eindhoven, Netherlands which takes place between 14 and 27 January 2010.

Take a look at the schedule of the nights she is due to perform:

Saturday 16 January:

Concert, Muziekcentrum, Eindhoven Eindhoven Airport Hall (Muziekcentrum, Eindhoven), starting at 20:15

Charles Ives, The Unanswered Question - Alina Ibragimova, Alexander Kagan, Steven Dann, Marc Vossen, Aldo Baerten, Alexander Fiterstein, Bart Schneeman, Esther Ursem & Alain de Rudder
-
Peter – Jan Wagemans, Summer Concerto, Neuss Kammerorchester & Storioni Trio m.m.v. Yi-ping Yang
Joseph Haydn, Cello concerto hob.VIIb:1, Neuss Kammerorchester & Nathalia Gutman

-Intermission-

Dmitri Shostakovich, Piano trio 1 opus 8, Storioni Trio

Giovanni Bottesini, Grand Duo Concertante, Neuss Kammerorchester, Alina Ibragimova & Niek de Groot

Gioachino Rossini, Ermione 'Essa corre al trionfo!', Neuss Kammerorchester & Nelly Miricioiu
Vincenzo Bellini , La Sonnambula, 'Ah non credea mirarti – Ah non giunge' , Neuss Kammerorchester & Nelly Miricioiu
Vincenzo Bellini, Il Pirata 'Colsorriso d'inocenza' , Neuss Kammerorchester & Nelly Miricioiu


Monday 18 January:

Concert, Tilburg, starting at 20:15

Joseph Haydn, Divertimento, Wouter Vossen, Hervé Joulain & Adrian Brendel
Ludwig van Beethoven, Variations on Manner welche liebe, Markus Groh & Li Wei Qin Igor Stravinsky, Concertino, Daedalus Quartet
Robert Schumann, Marchenerzahlungen op 132, Markus Groh, Steven Dann & Alexander Fiterstein
Ottorino Respighi, Songs, Nelly Miricioiu & Bart vd Roer - 1.Stornellatrice /
2.Invito alla danza/
3.Notturno
4.Pioggia
5.Luce
6.E se un giorno tornasse
-Intermission-
Franz Schubert, Forellen quintet op. 114 D667, Storioni Trio, Vladimir Mendelssohn & Niek de Groot

Wednesday 20 January:
- Masterclass at the Fontys Conservatorium

For the complete info about the Festival check out the official website

Introduction

Nelly is a great artist and even a greater human being. She loves the stage, her devoted fans and laughs when she is called La Miricioiu or at the idea that she is a "cult diva". She just loves being on stage and giving it her all.

La Miricioiu considers herself as much British as Romanian. She lives in London with Barry, her wonderful husband, Daniel their 18 year old son and her mother who at 80 is a fervent artist.

When she is not singing she loves cooking, throwing dinner parties for her friends, playing the piano, she's currently very much into Beethoven and listening to all sorts of music like Led Zeppelin, Queen, Muse, Red Hot Chili Peppers or Queen.

When Strictly Come Dancing and X Factor are on TV, you will find her in front of the TV and voting for her favourites competitors, also making sure that the shows are recorded should she be away singing in some corner of the world.

And when she's not singing, or cooking or watching TV, she likes surfing the Internet. Yes, she is very tech-savy and thinks You Tube is one of the best inventions ever.

She admires people like Freddie Mercury or the Romanian folk singer Maria Tanase and has a soft spot for Dolly Parton.

And this blog will give you some of those insights, as well as photos, complete performance information and should you have any questions or curiosities feel free to contact me at contact@nellymiricioiu.com.

Enjoy!