Opera News has added a new event to its popular Singers’ Studio interview series. On Friday, October 21, soprano Maria Guleghina will participate in a conversation with OPERA NEWS editor in chief F. Paul Driscoll. The interview will begin at 6 PM in the Opera Learning Center of the Metropolitan Opera Guild. Tickets are $25 if purchased in advance, $30 if purchased at the door and $12 for students. For tickets and information, call (212) 769-7028 or visit The Metropolitan Opera Guild’s Singers’ Studio ticketing page.
The scheduled Singers’ Studio interview with Peter Mattei, originally scheduled for October 17, has been canceled due to a scheduling conflict: Mr. Mattei has agreed to sing that evening’s performance of Don Giovanni at the Metropolitan Opera. Ticket-holders for the Mattei interview may transfer their tickets to the Guleghina event.
Born in Odessa, Ukraine, Maria Guleghina made her stage debut in Minsk, in 1985, and began her international career in 1987, as Amelia to Luciano Pavarotti’s Riccardo in Un Ballo in Maschera at La Scala. She made her Met debut in 1991, as Maddalena di Coigny in Andrea Chénier, and has since sung more than 150 performances with the company in New York and on tour. This season Guleghina returns to the Met as Abigaille in Nabucco, one of her signature roles in the dramatic-soprano repertory. Guleghina has starred in The Met: Live in HD transmissions of Il Trittico, Macbeth and Turandot, as well as Met telecasts of Andrea Chénier, Nabucco and Luciano Pavarotti’s Thirtieth Anniversary Gala. In 2002, Guleghina sang Dolly in the Met premiere of Wolf-Ferrari’s Sly, opposite Plácido Domingo. Her other Met roles include Tosca, Santuzza, Adriana Lecouvreur, Aida, Norma and Lisa in The Queen of Spades. Away from New York, Guleghina has sung leading roles with Opéra de Paris; Bayerische Staatsoper; Wiener Staatsoper; Hamburgische Staatsoper; the Mariinsky Theatre; the Norwegian National Opera; San Francisco Opera; Lyric Opera of Chicago and other theaters.