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INTRODUCTION
As always, we want to give you the best out of the best in anything, so we have many great surprises for you to discover in this month’s issue! In exclusivity, just for our charmingly loyal readers, we present you Cristina Pasaroiu | AntoNetta! All about being a primadonna in the world’s top opera houses and having a personal brand singing everything from opera to pop-electronic music. Also, you can find out more on topics such as embracing your true self, managing rejections, one’s goals as an artist when on stage and some secrets of a successful & fulfilling career. Check out one of this issue’s most fiery story in an interview signed by Cristina Fieraru.
BIOGRAPHY
Cristina Pasaroiu has been celebrated at many of the world’s most prestigious opera houses, concert halls and festivals. Lauded by the Financial Times for her “highly intense stage and musical presence”, “the versatility of her soprano, poignant low notes, high notes and passage work, enormous stamina and nuanced expression”, she was “undoubtedly” the “star of the evening”, “embodying all of Hoffmann’s loves. Among the Romanian soprano’s career highlights figure performances in great primadonna roles such as the title part of Suor Angelica at Gran Teatre del Liceu, La Traviata at Frankfurt Opera, Opéra de Nice, National Opera Bucharest, Aalto Theater Essen, Tiroler Festpiele Erl, Tokyo Spring Festival. Manon from Massenet at Seoul Arts Center and Theater Wiesbaden, Rachel in La Juive, Valentine in Les Huguentos at Nice Opera House; Magda in La Rondine at Deutsche Oper Berlin, Daegu Festival, Teatro Comunale Bologna, Opera de Lorraine Nancy, Micäela in Carmen at Vienna State Opera, Bavarian State Opera, Bregenz Festival, St.Margarethen Festival, Leila in Les pêcheurs de perles at Israeli Opera Tel Aviv, Mimì in La Bohème at Royal Danish Opera, Theater Basel, Caracalla Festival of Rome, Teatro Comunale Bologna, Teatro Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, Grand Opera Avignon, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Opera de Nice; Fiordiligi in Così fan tutte at Vlaamse Opera Antwerp, Gent, Wiesbaden, Desdemona in Verdi’s Otello at Frankfurt Opera, Contessa in Le nozze di Figaro at Theater an der Wien and Theater St.Gallen und Gilda in Rigoletto at Aalto-Theater Essen, Savolinna Opera Festival, Bucharest National Opera, Clausenburg etc. She is Adriana Lecouvreur at Frankfurt Opera, Opera Nice Côte d’Azur, Liu in Turandot at Deutsche Oper Berlin, Budapest Summer Festival, as well as Alice Ford in Falstaff at the Bayerische Staatsoper München. Cristina Pasaroiu made her highly acclaimed debut as Olympia / Antonia / Giulietta / Stella in a new production of Les Contes d’Hoffmann at the Deutsche Oper Berlin as well as at Seoul Arts Center. Other engagements of the last season include her debut in the title role of Alcina, Elisabetta di Valois in Don Carlo, Elettra in Idomeneo in Wiesbaden, Alice Ford at Bayerische Staatsoper München and Marietta in Die Tote Stadt at George Enescu Festival, which proclaimed her a revelation in this role. Till 2022 she accumulated more than 42 main roles on stage. The most recent projects include her debut in Il Tabarro, Gianni Schicchi, Suor Angelica – Il Trittico by Puccini and Il Trovatore at the Staatstheater Wiesbaden as well as Violetta Valèry at Aalto Theater Essen, Mimi in La Bohème at Opera de Nice and Deutsche Oper Berlin, Rusalka at Grand Opera Avignon and at Opera de Bordeaux, as well as concert tour next to Andrea Bocelli in Abu Dhabi, Al Ula, Malta, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Italy, Letonia, Polen, Norway, Scottland, Greece, Israel. Cristina Pasaroiu was born in Bucharest and began her singing studies at 12 years old at her hometown's Music School “Dinu Lipatti”, winning over 18 national and international competitions. She continued her studies at Haute Ecole de Musique de Genève, at Conservatorio Giuseppe Verdi in Milan with Maestro Vittorio Terranova and Dolora Zajick and she completed them at the Universität für Musik und Darstellende Kunst Vienna making her international debut at Teatro Comunale di Bologna at the age of 21. On the concert platform Cristina Pasaroiu is to be heard at the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Arnhem, London, Vienna Musikverein, Teatro Regio Parma, Modena, Alte Oper Frankfurt, Klangvokal Dortmund, Konzerthaus Berlin, as well as in Bejing, Paris, Montecarlo, Victoria Hall Genève, Nizza, Milan, Florence, Jerusalem, Spring Festival Toyko, Lotte Tower Seoul, Copenhagen Summer Festival, Herning, Budapest, Tel Aviv, Marbella Starlite Festival, etc
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INTERVIEW
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Alice Lechner comes from a music-loving family. Her first encounter with the opera universe was at the tender age of six. The grandeur of the stage productions and costumes, the backstage chatter, and last, but definitely not least, the music left her in awe, beginning with Mozart’s Don Giovanni. The overall feeling that opera awakens in anyone who gets a glimpse into this part of artistic eternity, that each and every day passes the test of time, was what drew her to stay and be a part of this world. The Opera House of Brașov became her second home, and the people who worked there were her second family.
Since then, Alice has devoted her spare time to maximising her musical knowledge through instrumental studies, studying both piano and violin for a short time. In the following years, her number one passion stepped out of the limelight and graciously gave way to Law Studies.
Since 2018 she has been studying Law at “Alexandru Ioan Cuza” University in Iași.
Her passion for opera, even if it is no longer her top professional priority in terms of career, it has most definitely become her priority during her free time. Wanting to experience the best of both worlds and extend her musical horizons, she regularly attends opera performances throughout Romania and abroad.
With OPERA Charm Magazine, Alice aims to nurture her creative side to help it flourish and bloom and to discover, alongside the magazine’s readers, the fascinatingly complex world of opera.
Currently, she is an LL.M. in Business Law at “Alexandru Ioan Cuza” University in Iași.
Oana Zamfir is a second year MA student at the “George Enescu” National University of Arts, at the Department of Musicology.
She studied violin for 12 years at the “Stefan Luchian” High School of Art in Botosani, later focusing on the theoretical aspects of music. In 2019 she completed her bachelor studies in Musicology as a student of the National Academy of Music “Gheorghe Dima” in Cluj-Napoca. Her research during 2018-2019 brought to the forefront elements of the archaic ritual within works of composers who activated during the communist period, giving her the opportunity to start a research internship at the “Carl von Ossietzky” University in Germany. In this context, she recorded conversations with members of the Sophie Drinker Institute in Bremen, and had access to documents directly from the Myriam Marbé archive.
Since 2019 she has been a teacher of Music Education and Theoretical Music Studies, making full use of interactive methods in the musical training of students and working, at the same time, with the children’s choir founded in the first year of her activity.
Her interests include pursuing a degree in interior design in 2020.
Alexandru Suciu inherited his passion for art growing up in a family of several generations of musicians. He began his musical studies at the “Augustin Bena” School of Music in Cluj, where he studied piano and guitar. Even though his main study direction was philological, his passion for music prevailed. He began his academical journey at the Faculty of Letters of the “Babeș-Bolyai” University, studying Comparative literature and English. He continued by studying Opera Singing at the “Gheorghe Dima” National Music Academy. He also graduated the Musical Education section, followed by Artistic Directing at the Musical Performing Arts department.
His multidisciplinary education opened the doors towards research, which is seen both through his participation in national and international conferences and symposia, such as the Salzburg Easter School PhD-forum, organized by the Salzburg Universität or the Silesian Meeting of Young Scholars, organized by the Institute of English at the University of Silesia, as well as the collaboration with Opera Charm Magazine.
During his student years, he won several prizes, including the Grand Prize at the “Paul Constantinescu” National Musical Interpretation Competition, the Romanian Composers and Musicologists’ Union Prize at the same competition, the First Prize and the Schubert Prize at the “Ada Ulubeanu” Competition.
He further developed his artistic skills by specializing in courses and masterclasses held by personalities such as Vittorio Terranova, Giuseppe Sabbatini, Marian Pop, Ines Salazar, Riccardo Zanellato, Paolo Bosisio, Valentina Farcaș and Manuel Lange in contexts such as the Internationale Sommerakademie für Operngesang Deutschlandsberg, Corso Internazionale di Canto Lirico I.M.C. Licata or the Europäische Akademie für Musik und darstellende Kunst Montepulciano. Besides his activity on-stage, he currently teaches Opera Singing Didactics, and Pedagogical Practice within the Department for Teacher Education and Training at the “Gheorghe Dima” National Music Academy.
Cristina is a 24 year-old Romanian soprano & a student at the National University of Music Bucharest, where she pursues the MA program in Vocal Performance.
She made her debut in Pamina from “Die Zauberflöte” by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart at only 19 years old at the Bucharest National Opera House, as a member of the Ludovic Spiess Experimental Opera Studio. Over the years she made her debut in roles such as Contessa d’Almaviva (Le nozze di Figaro), Mimì & Musetta (La Bohème), Alice Ford (Falstaff), Erste Dame (Die Zauberflöte) in her university’s opera productions.
Her passion and experience extends in the field of choral music, too.
She has been part of our dream team since the fall of 2021. For a good period of time she took care of OPERA Charm’s social media and took you on the monthly journey through the history of opera through our Legends rubric – and a few times through the Theaters around the World rubric.
Her little soul rubric – from 2021 to present – is definitely the Conductors of the Future, where, every month, she gives you the chance to meet a young star of the world of conducting and, of course, to find out what’s the most charming feature of opera in these artists’ views.
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