Biography
Guest of the National Theatre Opera.
The young Latvian soprano Maija Kovalevska hails from Riga, where she studied at the Jāzeps Vītols Latvian Academy of Music. Since 2003 she has been honing her technique with the world famous opera singer Mirella Freni. Maija Kovalevska has also won a host of prestigious awards, for example the Latvian Grand Music Award 2004 and in the year 2006 the first price in Operalia – Plácido Domingo the World Opera Competition in Valencia. She made her debut at the Latvian National Opera in Riga in the 2002/2003 season as Mozart’s Donna Elvira. In 2006 she launched her international career with the same role in Verona and Reggio Emilia. In the same year she sang Mimi in Puccini’s La bohème in Valencia. As Mimi she also debuted at the Metropolitan Opera in New York opposite Rollando Villazón and led by Plácido Domingo. In May 2007 she achieved great success at the Metropolitan Opera as Gluck’s Euridice under the baton of James Levine. At Salzburger Festspiele she debuted as Teresa in Berlioz’s opera Benvenuto Cellini, with musical preparation by Valery Gergiev.
In February 2008 she appeared as Bizet’s Micaela in Carmen at the Metropolitan Opera in New York in a Franco Zeffirelli’s production. Her repertoire also includes Giannetta in Donizetti’s L'elisir d'amore, the Countess from Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro, which she interpreted also in Tokyo and Berlin, Liu from Puccini’s Turandot and Leila from Bizet’s Les pêcheurs de perles. At this year’s Glyndebourne Festival in England she dazzled as Tatiana in Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin in a production directed by Graham Vick and conducted by Vladimir Jurowski. In 2009 she will again perform as Mimi at New York’s Metropolitan Opera and as Liu in Washington. She will also make operatic debuts in San Francisco, Paris and Munich.
Update: August 2008