Anna Caterina Antonacci

Introduction

Anna Caterina Antonacci is now acknowledged as a major artist, and her extraordinary vocal timbre and great acting skills have enabled her to perform a vast and varied repertoire in the world’s most important theatres. 

She had a great success with the title role in Medea in Toulouse, at the Epidaurus Amphitheatre, at the Teatro Regio, Turin and at the Châtelet where she also sang Cassandre in Les Troyens with Sir John Eliot Gardiner to universal acclaim.

Anna Caterina recently made her debut in a new production of Carmen at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden with Antonio Pappano. She also also sang Berlioz' Le Mort de Cleopatre with Sir John Eliot Gardiner at La Scala and Berlioz Les Nuits d'Ete with Bartoletti in Parma. She has also performed Rachel in La Juive at the Opéra de Paris and Medea at the Epidarous Theatre. Furthermore, she has sung Berlioz Les Nuits d'Ete in Munich and with the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, in Ferrara with Tugan Sokhiev, and Cassandre in Les Troyens at the Grand Théâtre in Geneva and with the Boston SO conducted by James Levine in Tanglewood. She has also sung La Damnation de Faust at the Marseille Opera and with the Orchestre du Capitole in Toulouse, Elisabetta in Maria Stuarda at La Scala, Alice Ford in Falstaff at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, Medea at the Teatro Regio Turin and Carmen at the Opera Comique conducted by John Eliot Gardiner. She has also recently sung La Mort de Cleopatre with the Rotterdam PO conducted by Yannick Nézét-Seguin and with the Hong Kong PO conducted by John Nelson.

Her future engagements include Carmen at the Deutsche Oper Berlin, Baden Baden Festival, Royal Danish Opera and at the Liceu in Barcelona, Cassandra in Les Troyens at the Royal Opera House in London, Deutsche Oper Berlin and at La Scala in Milan conducted by Antonio Pappano, Vita by Marco Tutino at the Teatro Regio in Turin and Rossini’s Otello at Lyon Opera conducted by Evelino Pido.

Upcoming concert performances will include Pergolesi's Stabat Mater with the English Concert, La morte de Cleopatre with the LPO conducted by Yannick Nézét-Seguin, again with the Orchestre National de France conducted by John Eliot Gardiner and also at the Teatro di San Carlo in Naples, Les nuits d’ete with the Tonhalle Zurich with Yannick Nézét-Seguin, and a selection of Cantaloube’s Chants d’Auvergnes at the BBC Proms with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales conducted by François-Xavier Roth.

Anna Caterina will also continue to give concerts of her one woman shows Era la Notte and Altre stelle; a collection of Baroque arias; and a solo recital tour including composers such as Hahn, Tosti, Toscanini, Bachelet, Tirinidelli and Respighi among others, accompanied by Donald Sulzen, at venues including the Grand Théâtre de Genève, Cologne Opera, Opera du Rhin in Strasbourg, Athens Concert Hall, Opera Comique, Teatro San Carlo in Naples and also in Sao Paolo.

She has also just been awarded the 'Chevalier de l'Ordre National de la Légion d'honneur' by the French Republic, which is the highest national distinction one can receive.

She now records for the Naïve label and her first recording of Era la Notte has received great acclaim.

Biography

Press Reviews

"At Paris's most beautiful lyric theatre, the Opéra Comique, two Englishmen are showing the French how to perform their national opera. Bizet's Carmen was premiered in the house that preceded the present building, and it has racked up close to 3,000 performances on the same site since its premiere in 1875, a period in which it has been transformed from brilliant, airy, Mozartian opéra comique, into a kind of bloated, proto-veismp potboiler. It has taken "le plus francophile des chefs d'orchestre britannqiues", John Eliot Gardiner, to restore something like the original Carmen in all her magnificent glory. In the Opéra Comique's new production, he is aided by the former RSC boss Adrian Noble, who eschews cliché in a pared-down, stripped-to-the-bear-essentials approach to the dramaturgy of Bizet's score, which allows the wonderful Anna Caterina Antonacci to portray the sensual, witty, doomed antiheroine with devastating truthfulness...Carmen has never sounded more revolutionary, romantic or thrillingly vibrant..."

The Times, June 21 2009

Carmen, The Opéra Comique, with Sir John Eliot Gardiner.

"It is the rare singer who can command the support of an orchetra for a concert of arias. Having the event be fully staged, with sets and costumes, is almost unheard of. But the soprano Anna Caterina Antonacci is a favourite in Paris, as she is likely to be anywhere she appears, and the Théâtre des Champs Élysées is currently presenting "Altre stelle" ("Other Stars", Dante's term about the power of love), a program of landmark French Opera arias linked by the theme of unrequited love. A searching artist, a compelling actress and a strikingly attractive woman, Ms. Antonacci does them honour, as she wrestles with each character's conflicting feelings, including whether to exact revenge. Rameau's Phèdre and Cherubini's Médée choose to do so, with dire consequences; Gluck's Armide and Berlioz's Didon simply give way to despair..."                       

The New York Times, April 29 2009

Altre Stelle, Théâtre des Champs Élysées.

"Daring to the point of recklessness in her use of vocal colours, Anna Caterina Antonacci has claimed Il Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda as he own, taking the roles of both combatants and the narrator who witnesses their battle, and conveying in tone and gesture the heaviness of armour, the dull clash of swords, the heat of blood, the coolness of the night, and the faint rays of dawn. Centrepiece of her only recording, Era la Notte, Antonacci's impersonation of Monteverdi's masterpiece was also the highlight of her recital with Harry Bicket and the English Concert at the Wigmore Hall..."                                                                                      

The Independant on Sunday, February 1 2009

Wigmore Hall concert with The English Concert and Harry Bicket.

"Maverick soprano Anna Caterina Antonacci has forces a reappraisal of Monteverdi's Il Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda, of late, by performing it as a one-woman show. Occupying territory somewhere between madrigal and opera, the piece examines the relationships between desire, aggression and faith in ways that resist analysis. Enemies in religious war, Tancredi and the Amazonian Clorinda are lovers away from the battlefield, but they savage each other in combat, where their armour prevents them from recognising each other. The music pares narrative down to its absolute essence: at once extreme and itimite, it is unique. Monteverdi wrote it for three singers: two lovers and a narrator. With the English Concert under Harry Bicket, however, Antonacci transformed it into a monologue of ferocious complexity and density. A great actor as well as a singer, she gave equal weight to words and song: the textis by Tasso, and Antonacci never let you forget that you were listening to someof the greatest poetry in European literature. Inauthentic it may have been, but it was also stupdendous. [...] Antonacci maintained the tragic mood with Barbara Strozzi's Lagrime mie and a performance of Addio Roma from Monteverdi's The Coronation of Poppea that was shocking in its self-lacerating intensity. As a concert, it was rather bitty - but that performance of Il Comattimento was unforgettable."                  

The Guardian, January 30 2009

Wigmore Hall concert with The English Concert and Harry Bicket.

Discography

ERA LA NOTTE - to buy click here

CLAUDIO MONTEVERDI Lamento d'Ariana, Lasciatemi morire

BARBARA  STROZZI Lamento: Lagrime mie, a che vi trattenete

PIETRO ANTONIO GIRAMO Lamento della pazza, Chi non conosce

CLAUDIO MONTEVERDI Il Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda

Modo Antiquo, Federico Maria Sardelli

Naïve V 5050, AD 090, April 2006

www.naiveclassique.com

BIZET Carmen [DVD]

Royal Opera House, Pappano, Kaufmann, Zambello

Decca, September 2008

BERLIOZ Les Troyens (Cassandre) [DVD]

Châtalet Theatre, Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Graham, Kunde, Tézier, Naouri

Opus Arte, August 2004

MONTEVERDI L'incoronazione di Poppea

Bayerische Staatsoper, Ivor Bolton, Daniels, Moll

Farao Classics, January 2008

CHERUBINI Medea [DVD]

Teatro Regio Torino, Parodi, Forte, Mingardo, Filianoti

Hardy Classics DVD, June 2009

HANDEL Rodelinda [DVD]

Glyndebourne Festival Opera, William Christie, Sreit, Chiummo, Winter, Scholl

Kultur, August 2005

ROSSINI Ermione [DVD]

Glyndebourne Festival Opera, Montague, Ford, Lopez-Yanez, Kelly

Kultur, November 2005

DONIZETTI Maria Stuarda (Elisabetta) [DVD]

Teatro alla Scala, Meli, Devia

Arthaus, February 2009

MOZART Don Giovanni (Donna Elvira) [DVD]

Wiener Staatsoper, Muti, Pieczonka, Kirchschlager, Schade, Alvarez, d'Arcangelo

Tdk, May 2005

Repertoire

OPERA:

BELLINI I Capuletti e i Montecchi (Romeo)

BELLINI Il Pirata

BELLINI I Puritani (Malibran version)

BERLIOZ La Damnation de Faust

BERLIOZ Les Troyens (Cassandre)

BIZET Carmen

CHERUBINI Medea

DONIZETTI Maria Stuarda

DONIZETTI Anna Bolena

DONIZETTI Roberto Devereux

DONIZETTI Fausta

DONIZETTI Maria di Rudenz

DONIZETTI Caterina Cornaro

DONIZETTI Poliuto

GLUCK Armide

GLUCK Alceste

GLUCK Iphigenie en Tauride

HANDEL Agrippina

MASSENET Le Cyd

MONTEVERDI Poppea

MONTEVERDI Nerone

MONTEVERDI Orfeo

MOZART Idomeneo (Elettra)

MOZART Cosi fan tutte (Fiordiligi)

MOZART Don Giovanni (Donna Elvira)

MOZART Clemenza di Tito (Vitellia)

PAISIELLO Nina pazza per amore

ROSSINI La Donna del lago

ROSSINI Semiramide

ROSSINI Ermione

ROSSINI Mose' in Egitto

ROSSINI Elisabetta Regina D'Inghilterra

ROSSINI Armida

ROSSINI La Gazza Ladra

ROSSINI Guglielmo Tell

SPONTINI La Vestale

VERDI I Masnadieri (Amalia)

VERDI Falstaff (Alice)

CONCERT:

BERLIOZ Les Nuits d'ete

BERLIOZ La Mort de Cleopatra

BERLIOZ La Mort d'Ophelia

CHAUSSON Poeme de l'amour et de la mer

CHERUBINI Stabat Mater

MENDELSSOHN Lobgesang

PERGOLESI Stabat Mater

POULENC La Voix Humaine

RAVEL Sheherazade

ROSSINI Sabat Mater

ROSSINI Petit Messe Solemnelle

STRAVINSKY Pulcinella

WAGNER Wesendonck Lieder

Links

Contact

Fabiana Dalpiaz

Etta Morgan

World Management

Publicity Downloads

Article from Greece for Gluck's 'Alceste' - Page 1

Article from Greece for Gluck's 'Alceste' - Page 2