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Superstar Angela Gheorghiu, the most glamorous and gifted opera singer of our time, was born in the small Romanian town Adjud. From early childhood it was obvious that she will become a singer, her destiny was the music. 60k Followers, 1,053 Following, 1,142 Posts - See Instagram photos and videos from Angela Gheorghiu (@angelagheorghiuofficial).
Superstar Angela Gheorghiu, the most glamorous and gifted opera singer of our time, was born in the small Romanian town Adjud. From early childhood it was obvious that she will become a singer, her destiny was the music. She attended the Music School in Bucharest and graduated from the Bucharest
Superstar Angela Gheorghiu, the most glamorous and gifted opera singer of our time, was born in the small Romanian town Adjud. From early childhood it was obvious that she will become a singer, her destiny was the music. She attended the Music School in Bucharest and graduated from the Bucharest Music Academy, where she studied with the remarkable music teacher Mia Barbu. Ms. Gheorghiu's magnificent voice and dazzling stage presence have established her as a unique international opera superstar.
Angela Gheorghiu was born in Romania. In 1992, she made her international debut at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, followed the same year by debuts at the Metropolitan Opera and the Wiener Staatsoper. Since then, she has graced the stages of the world's opera houses and concert halls, excelling both vocally and dramatically. Today, at the height of her career - and looking as glamorous as ever - she is widely recognised by critics and opera lovers as one of the great sopranos of all time.
In 1998, Gheorghiu signed an exclusive contract with EMI Classics for whom she has recorded Puccini's Madama Butterfly, Tosca and Il trittico, Massenet's Manon and Werther, Gounod's Roméo et Juliette, Bizet's Carmen and Verdi's Il trovatore, several duet albums with Roberto Alagna and concerts with orchestra or choir and orchestra including Verdi's Requiem, Live from La Scala, Live from Covent Garden, Casta Diva, My Puccini, and Diva.
All her CDs have received widespread critical acclaim and have been awarded many prizes such as Gramophone Awards, Diapason d’Or Awards, Choc du Monde de la Musique in France, Cecilia Prize in Belgium, Deutsche Schallplattenkritik-Preis in Germany, the Echo Award, the Italian Musica e dischi Foreign Lyric Production Award, the USA Critics’ Award etc. Mrs Gheorghiu won the title of “Female Artist of the Year” at the Classical Brit Awards in 2001 and 2010.
Last year she made her much-acclaimed debut in Cilea’s Adriana Lecouvreur, a new production of the Royal Opera House Covent Garden. The Observer wrote: 'It's hard to imagine anyone bettering Angela Gheorghiu in this part. Her voice, feather-light and creamy yet with a core of steel, matches the liquid way she moves on stage. She's a natural actress and made the improbable death scene heartbreakingly believable and her signature aria 'Poveri fiori' simply unforgettable.'
After Angela Gheorghiu's July 2011, performances as Tosca with Jonas Kaufmann and Bryn Terfel at The Royal Opera House under the baton of Antonio Pappano, The Independent wrote, 'Gheorghiu, like Tosca, is a born diva.' The Guardian added, 'Her bloodcurdling outburst at the realisation that (Mario) is dead, not merely pretending, reminded us why this Romanian diva draws the crowds.' This production will be screened in cinemas around the world in the autumn.
Angela Gheorghiu's 2011-2012 season includes performances in Gounod's Faust at London's Royal Opera House, in Puccini's La Bohème at the Gran Teatre del Liceu, Barcelona, the Staatsoper Hamburg, the Nationaltheater, Munich and La Scala, Milan, a concert performance of Cilea's Adriana Lecouvreur at New York's Carnegie Hall and song recitals in Tokyo, Essen, Washington, D.C. and Paris.
Angela Gheorghiu's latest project on EMI Classics is 'Homage to Maria Callas', a collection of beloved French and Italian operatic masterpieces. The programme is inspired by the career and recordings of Maria Callas, the greatest diva of the last century. The arias are shared favourites of both Callas and Gheorghiu, and Angela's new recording demonstrates once again her extraordinary vocal and emotional range.
Recorded at London's iconic Abbey Road Studios and in New York, the repertoire of Gheorghiu's first studio recital in six years (during which time she recorded several complete operas, including a multi-award-winning Madama Butterfly), shows her versatility in lyric, spinto and mezzo roles, with each of which she feels a strong emotional connection.
In January 2006 she triumphed with La Traviata at the MET in New York. Three months later, in April, she made her debut in Teatro alla Scala in Milano with a recital, in May she opened the Film Festival in Cannes. In June 2006 she made her stage debut in Tosca at the ROH Covent Garden in London. Then she returned to the Vienna Staatsoper for performances of La Bohème (November 2007) and to the MET for a series of Simon Boccanegra and a gala performance of La Traviata (March 2007).
All her CDs have received widespread critical acclaim and have been awarded many prizes such as Gramophone Awards, Diapason d’Or Awards, Choc du Monde de la Musique in France, Cecilia Prize in Belgium, Deutsche Schallplattenkritik-Preis in Germany, the Echo Award, the Italian Musica e dischi Foreign Lyric Production Award, the USA Critics’ Award etc. Mrs Gheorghiu won the title of “Female Artist of the Year” at the Classical Brit Awards in 2001 and 2010.
Last year she made her much-acclaimed debut in Cilea’s Adriana Lecouvreur, a new production of the Royal Opera House Covent Garden. The Observer wrote: 'It's hard to imagine anyone bettering Angela Gheorghiu in this part. Her voice, feather-light and creamy yet with a core of steel, matches the liquid way she moves on stage. She's a natural actress and made the improbable death scene heartbreakingly believable and her signature aria 'Poveri fiori' simply unforgettable.'
After Angela Gheorghiu's July 2011, performances as Tosca with Jonas Kaufmann and Bryn Terfel at The Royal Opera House under the baton of Antonio Pappano, The Independent wrote, 'Gheorghiu, like Tosca, is a born diva.' The Guardian added, 'Her bloodcurdling outburst at the realisation that (Mario) is dead, not merely pretending, reminded us why this Romanian diva draws the crowds.' This production will be screened in cinemas around the world in the autumn.
Angela Gheorghiu's 2011-2012 season includes performances in Gounod's Faust at London's Royal Opera House, in Puccini's La Bohème at the Gran Teatre del Liceu, Barcelona, the Staatsoper Hamburg, the Nationaltheater, Munich and La Scala, Milan, a concert performance of Cilea's Adriana Lecouvreur at New York's Carnegie Hall and song recitals in Tokyo, Essen, Washington, D.C. and Paris.
Angela Gheorghiu's latest project on EMI Classics is 'Homage to Maria Callas', a collection of beloved French and Italian operatic masterpieces. The programme is inspired by the career and recordings of Maria Callas, the greatest diva of the last century. The arias are shared favourites of both Callas and Gheorghiu, and Angela's new recording demonstrates once again her extraordinary vocal and emotional range.
Recorded at London's iconic Abbey Road Studios and in New York, the repertoire of Gheorghiu's first studio recital in six years (during which time she recorded several complete operas, including a multi-award-winning Madama Butterfly), shows her versatility in lyric, spinto and mezzo roles, with each of which she feels a strong emotional connection.
In January 2006 she triumphed with La Traviata at the MET in New York. Three months later, in April, she made her debut in Teatro alla Scala in Milano with a recital, in May she opened the Film Festival in Cannes. In June 2006 she made her stage debut in Tosca at the ROH Covent Garden in London. Then she returned to the Vienna Staatsoper for performances of La Bohème (November 2007) and to the MET for a series of Simon Boccanegra and a gala performance of La Traviata (March 2007).
It was again La Traviata that she performed in Rome and in Teatro alla Scala in Milano in 2007. She also had some much-acclaimed concerts in Paris (Salle Pleyel and Palais Garnier) and in Los Angeles. In September last year she performed in Marseille the title role in the world premiere of the opera Marius et Fanny of the composer Vladimir Cosma. In November she sang a series of much-praised performances of La Rondine in San Francisco. When Ms. Gheorghiu sang lately La Bohème at the MET in New York, the performance was transmitted in cinemas to an audience of over one million and five hundred thousand people. Also her performances of La Traviata in Milan and in Rome and La Rondine in San Francisco and New York were transmitted in cinemas.
All these performances and recitals have confirmed Ms. Gheorghiu’s status as one of the most beloved stars of opera. For more than ten years she has been married to the French-Italian tenor Roberto Alagna. The wedding ceremony took place on the stage of the Metropolitan Opera New York, during a performance of La Bohème, in 1996 and was celebrated by the Mayor of New York, Mr. Rudolph Giuliani. Angela Gheorghiu and Roberto Alagna have immediately been considered the Golden Couple of Opera. They have sung plenty of performances together and recorded various CDs together. On the 20th of June this year they sung together a much praised open-air concert in the Prospect Park in New York.
Angela Gheorghiu has collaborated with the most prestigious opera directors and conductors of our time and has sung with the most important opera singers.
Future engagements include various concerts, as well as performances of L’Elisir d’Amore at the Met in New York and performances of La Traviata in Berlin and Munich.
In future, she will also appear in Lucia di Lammermoor, Adriana Lecouvreur, Manon Lescaut, Tosca, Lucrezia Borgia, Alceste, Don Carlos, Don Giovanni and in The Ghosts of Versailles.
Ms. Gheorghiu was honoured with “La Medaille Vermeille de la Ville de Paris”, and she was appointed an “Officier de l’Ordre des Arts et Lettres” and a “Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et Lettres” by the French Ministry of Culture and by her native country Romania.
Releases
Romanian Songs
Eternamente
The Complete Recitals on Warner Classics
Live from Covent Garden
Videos
Gallery
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Angela Gheorghiu, as befits the woman described as “the last of the divas”, doesn’t so much enter the hotel suite in Paris where we meet, as sweep in. She could have stepped out of an earlier age of glamour – she has the looks and the style. But, above all, she has that gorgeous voice. Many believe her to be the greatest soprano of our times.
Angela Gheorghiu, as befits the woman described as “the last of the divas”, doesn’t so much enter the hotel suite in Paris where we meet, as sweep in. She could have stepped out of an earlier age of glamour – she has the looks and the style. But, above all, she has that gorgeous voice. Many believe her to be the greatest soprano of our times.
Born in Moldavia, she graduated from the Bucharest Music Academy in Romania in 1990 and made her debut at Covent Garden only two years later. But what rocketed her to stardom was her performance in La Traviata in 1994. Conductor Sir Georg Solti was moved to tears and insisted on casting her as Violetta. The BBC cleared a whole evening to broadcast her performance live from Covent Garden, while The Sunday Times described her voice as “a liquid instrument of great lyrical beauty with gleaming spun-gold notes” and proclaimed her a worthy successor to Maria Callas. Recording and live contracts and awards were showered on her.
In a ceremony conducted by Mayor Giuliani in New York in 1996 Gheorghiu married Sicilian-born tenor Roberto Alagna, and they became opera’s most glamorous couple – a seemingly unstoppable force.
Talking to Gheorghiu, you do get a sense of her steely determination to succeed. After all, she’s a train driver’s daughter from a small town in Eastern Europe who has become one of the most successful opera singers in the world.
“I knew from almost as far back as I can remember I would be an opera singer,” she explains.
Whatever the problems in Romania under Ceacescu’s communist dictatorship, Gheorghiu has no criticism of the music education: “There was classical music on the TV nearly every day. I remember watching things like Leonard Bernstein’s programmes about classical music with my father.”
She still has a house in Romania and remains loyal to her homeland, pointing out that “there have been many great Romanian singers, like Nelly Miricioiu. I think it’s a little unfair that in the East we learn all about the history and geography of the West, but people in the West know so little of Romania.”
I ask whether she had to perform in the mass communist rallies: “You had no choice. But I never sang in a choir, only by myself.”
She laughs, recognising this as a rather diva-like thing to say. I begin to see why some people in the opera world find her difficult to work with. When she was told she was expected to die in a hospital ward for Jonathan Miller’s production of La Traviata at the Bastille Opera, she declared: “Impossible! I die alone.” She tells me, with a wicked smile, that she thinks opera director and physician Miller should stick to being a doctor.
While there may be no love lost between Miller and Gheorghiu, other directors are more than happy to work with her. Sir Richard Eyre proclaimed her to be a “delight”, and she repays the compliment.
“He sat us down and read through the opera as though it was a play – then he gets to the music. He realises that when the rehearsals are over I’m alone on stage.”
But her favourite director is Franco Zeffirelli. Lastpass and safari ios. “He adores opera and has such a feel for theatre. I wish all young directors could spend some time with him to understand the real atmosphere of theatre.”
Gheorghiu is certainly a woman of strong opinions. But she is also charming, and fun. I tell her I was a little nervous of meeting her, because to read some of the stories in the press you’d think she was a bit of a monster.
She gives me her biggest smile yet, with just a hint of menace: “There is such a thing as a nice monster, you know.”
Her view is that “people like to create a scandal out of nothing. But none of that is remembered, what is remembered is beautiful work.”
She is very interested in posterity – a current obsession is with opera films, which can be seen by generations to come. She is planning a film of Carmen with director Carlos Saura.
Her latest CD is a collection of her best-known arias including Casta Diva from Norma, L’amour est enfant de bohème from Bizet’s Carmen among others.
“It’s a kind of greatest hits I suppose. There are some arias I adore and that audiences love as well.”
I ask her whether she would like to sing more contemporary music and she says, “I would love to. The problem with most of the modern music I hear is that it would ruin my voice.”
One idea she has had is to appear in a new opera as a figure such as Jackie Onassis. It’s easy enough to picture her as Jackie O, I say.
I add that she is very different from some other singers I’ve met, like Angelika Kirschlager, who turned up dressed fairly scruffily in jeans and a t-shirt. Gheorghiu disapproves of what she calls “anti-divas”.
Angela Gheorghiu Dvd
“I know that I’m not like everyone else. The artist is someone who makes people dream, or makes them cry, who moves thousands of people. There is too much reality – I don’t want to see a star brushing their teeth in a movie.”
She thinks it absurd when wealthy people dress as though they were poor: “I saw some jeans on sale for £500 that had rips in them. How crazy is that?” (Gheorghiu would never be seen in public in any type of jeans. One story had her demanding a make-up artist and limo for an interview on Radio 3.)
While I like Kirschlager’s relaxed attitude, I do understand Gheorghiu’s point – I would be disappointed if I saw the Queen on the bus dressed in jeans.
“She is such a sweet person,” says Gheorghiu. It takes Classic FM a second to realise she means the Queen. “She is a friend of mine. I know all the Royals. Especially Prince Charles. Some people go to concerts to be seen, but he goes because he loves the music.”
When I ask her which other singers she admires, she names Aretha Franklin and Norah Jones, not mentioning any other opera singers except her husband.
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“He is the best. There is no one like him,” she says loyally. Rumours of marital difficulties have surfaced recently, but she paints a picture of domestic bliss.
“We know how to switch off, to take time away from music, to watch movies and to be with our family.”
They look after Alagna’s child from his previous marriage and Gheorghiu’s sister’s child – her sister tragically died in a car accident. The family has a house in Switzerland and one in Romania, but she thinks of London as her other home. With EMI in London producing new records and further appearances booked at the Opera House, it looks like we will be seeing a lot more of this larger-than-life diva with one of the most stunning voices in the world.