Anna Netrebko

“A soprano with star power in the best sense, a charismatic expressivity that pervades every element of her performance.”

– Anthony Tommasini, New York Times

The reigning prima donna of the 21st century, soprano Anna Netrebko redefines what it means to be an opera star. From singing at the opening ceremony of the 2014 Winter Olympics to becoming the first classical artist to be named to TIME magazine’s list of the 100 most influential people in the world, she has taken up the mantle as opera’s leading global ambassador and is widely recognized as one of the most compelling, committed performing artists today. Having already made an indelible mark on many of opera’s most iconic heroines – both in performances and on award-winning recordings – Anna continues to reach new heights as she ventures into bolder, more dramatic repertoire. Offstage, she shares her infectious joie de vivre – along with her love of family, fashion, and food – on social media, inspiring people to live their most colorful lives and celebrate what makes them unique.

Now at the peak of her powers, Anna is drawing on the exceptional maturation of her voice to conquer the most demanding roles of her career. Her debut as Giovanna d’Arco at the Salzburg Festival in the summer of 2013, and the coinciding release of her Verdi album on Deutsche Grammophon, marked a major turning point as she began to leave behind the lighter, more lyric roles for which she had first become known. Soon followed her first performances as Leonora in Il trovatore at the Berlin State Opera; the title character in Puccini’s Manon Lescaut at the Rome Opera under Riccardo Muti and opposite Azerbaijani tenor Yusif Eyvazov, who would later become her husband; and Verdi’s Lady Macbeth at Munich’s Bavarian State Opera, a role she reprised in 2015-16 to open the Metropolitan Opera’s tenth anniversary of “Live in HD” cinecasts (one of the only singers to have starred in every season, she is the acknowledged face of the series). If there were any doubts that she would be ensconced in the annals of operatic history, they were dispelled when, in the 2015-16 season, she triumphed as Giovanna d’Arco in her first opening night of La Scala and made her first foray into Wagner as Elsa in Lohengrin in Dresden.

Anna continues her transition into heavier, more complex roles in the 2017-18 season with debuts as Aida at the Salzburg Festival, as Maddalena in Giordano’s Andrea Chénier for her second opening night of La Scala – this time opposite Eyvazov as the title character – and Tosca at the Metropolitan Opera, all in new productions. At the Vienna State Opera, she sings Leonora to Eyvazov’s Manrico and later makes her company role debut as Cilea’s Adriana Lecouvreur, a character she first portrayed over the summer at St. Petersburg’s Mariinsky Theatre. Later, at the Paris Opera, she revisits her once signature role of Violetta in La traviata, which she brought out of retirement last season at La Scala. In the spring she brings her celebrated portrayal of Lady Macbeth to London’s Royal Opera House for the first time. On the concert stage, she and Eyvazov kick off a season-long concert tour at Berlin’s Waldbühne amphitheater in August and later travel to Dubai, Japan, Korea, Australia, New Zealand, Monaco, Moscow, and Belarus, singing both operatic repertoire and songs from their new duets recording, Romanza. They conclude their tour with a performance at London’s Royal Albert Hall in May.

Anna’s present dominance represents the culmination of more than two decades on the opera stage. It was in considerably lighter fare that she first burst onto the international scene, pairing her already rich and flexible voice with vivacity, sensuality and wit in the ingénue lyric roles of Mozart and bel canto opera. She made her stage debut at just 22, as Susanna in Le nozze di Figaro at the Kirov Opera under the baton of her then mentor, Valery Gergiev. However, it was in 2002, bookended by memorable first appearances at the Met and Covent Garden, that her triumphant Salzburg Festival performances as Donna Anna in Don Giovanni most decisively announced her arrival as a star. Fresh successes followed, in signature roles that also included the leading ladies of Verdi’s La traviata, Puccini’s La bohème, Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette, Massenet’s Manon, Bellini’s La sonnambula, Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor, Don Pasquale and L’elisir d’amore, and Prokofiev’s War and Peace. These took her to such leading opera houses as the Met, San Francisco Opera, London’s Royal Opera House, Vienna State Opera, Paris Opera, Zurich Opera, Berlin State Opera, and Munich’s Bavarian State Opera, as well as back to Salzburg, where she became a regular fixture. She appeared as herself alongside Anne Hathaway and Julie Andrews in Hollywood’s Princess Diaries II (2004) and performed alongside Plácido Domingo for an audience of tens of thousands at Berlin’s Waldbühne on the eve of the 2006 World Cup soccer final. In 2007, the year she was named to the “Time 100” list, she headlined London’s famous “Last Night of the Proms,” made her Carnegie Hall debut in concert with Dmitri Hvorostovsky, and serenaded film director Martin Scorsese on the CBS broadcast of the 30th Annual Kennedy Center Honors in front of the President of the United States. In 2016 she became one of only a few artists ever to perform a sold-out solo recital at the Metropolitan Opera.

Netrebko had attained superstar status, but her thirst for new challenges and increasingly powerful voice drew her to ever more complex roles. These included the title character of Tchaikovsky’s Iolanta and Tatiana in Eugene Onegin, as well as Donizetti’s Anna Bolena, a notoriously formidable part that in 2011 – the year she made her debut at Milan’s La Scala – was the vehicle for a triumph in the Met’s premiere staging of the opera. This marked the first of an unprecedented three consecutive season-opening productions she would headline at the New York house, culminating with a new treatment of Eugene Onegin in 2013-14. She scored similar successes beyond the opera house, starring in Robert Dornhelm’s La bohème: The Film, released in 2008 to mark the composer’s 150th birthday; singing alongside Andrea Bocelli in the BBC’s telecast of the 2008 Classical BRIT Awards; giving a recital with Daniel Barenboim at the Berlin Philharmonie; appearing as a featured performer at Newsweek and Daily Beast’s 2012 Women In the World Summit; and reuniting with Hvorostovsky for a televised concert at Moscow’s Red Square. Affirming her standing as one of Russia’s national treasures, she was chosen to sing the Olympic Hymn live at the internationally televised opening ceremony of the 2014 Olympic Winter Games in Sochi.

An exclusive Deutsche Grammophon recording artist since 2003, the soprano boasts an extensive discography that includes solo albums, complete opera recordings, and concert repertoire. Her 2016 solo release, Verismo, debuted at No. 1 on the classical charts in dozens of countries, besides scoring a Grammy nomination and winning the Diapason d’Or de l’Année award in the “Vocal Recital” category. Her previous solo albums for the yellow label – Opera Arias, Sempre Libera, Duets, Russian Album, Souvenirs, In the Still of Night, Anna Netrebko: Live at the Metropolitan Opera, Anna Netrebko: Verdi, and Verismo – have all been bestsellers, as have her full-length recordings of La traviata, Le nozze di Figaro, La bohème, I Capuleti e i Montecchi, Giovanna d’Arco, Iolanta, Manon Lescaut, Britten’s War Requiem, the Stabat Maters of both Pergolesi and Rossini, and Strauss’ Four Last Songs. Her Wagner debut in Lohengrin was recently release on DVD and Blu-ray, while other highlights from her videography include Ruslan and Lyudmila, Betrothal in a Monastery, La traviata, Le nozze di Figaro, I puritani, Manon, Lucia di Lammermoor, Don Pasquale, Anna Bolena, Eugene Onegin, La bohème, Don Giovanni, Il trovatore, Macbeth; and a DVD of music videos, titled Anna Netrebko: The Woman, The Voice.

Netrebko’s other honors and awards include Grammy nominations for her recordings Violetta and Russian Album; a 2017 International Opera Award for “Best Female Singer”; the 2016 Opera News Award; Musical America’s 2008 “Musician of the Year”; Germany’s prestigious Bambi Award; the UK’s Classical BRIT Awards for “Singer of the Year” and “Female Artist of the Year”; and eleven German ECHO Klassik awards that include “Singer of the Year.” A dual citizen of Austria, in 2017 she was awarded the country’s “Kammersängerin”—bestowed only upon its most distinguished opera singers. In her native Russia, she was awarded the Russian State Prize (the country’s highest award in the field of arts and literature) in 2005, and in 2008 she was given the title of “People’s Artist of Russia.”

Born in 1971 in Krasnodar, Russia, Anna Netrebko studied vocal performance at the St. Petersburg Conservatory. A mother and passionate advocate for children’s causes, she supports a number of charitable organizations, including SOS-Kinderdorf International and the Russian Children’s Welfare Society. Since 2006, she has been a global ambassador for Chopard jewelry.