Biography
Soprano Lucie Kaňková is a regular guest of the National Theatre Opera. She made her debut at the Estates Theatre in 2021 as the Queen of the Night in Mozart's Die Zauberflöte. In 2022 she made her first appearance at the State Opera as Gilda in Verdi's Rigoletto.
She studied singing at the Opera Studio in Biel, Switzerland under Barbara Locher and continued her studies at the University of Lucerne. In the 2014/15 season, she performed the roles of the Kitchen boy (Dvořák: Rusalka) and Luigi (Donizetti: Viva la mamma) at Theater Biel-Solothurn. In 2016 she staged her own opera project Ariadne by Bohuslav Martinů in Biel, Switzerland, in which she played the title role. In 2018 she also appeared in this role at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein in Düsseldorf. In 2019, she performed the role of Time and Fortune in Karl Ditters von Dittersdorf's opera Il tribunale di Giove at the Olomouc Baroque Festival, the Janáček May Festival and the Hortus Magicus Festival in Kroměříž. At the State Opera in Prague she appeared as Violetta in Verdi's La traviata. Her repertoire also includes Anna (Weber: Der Freischütz), Susanna (Mozart: Le nozze di Figaro), Poppea (Monteverdi: L’incoronazione di Poppea) and Barče (Smetana: The Kiss). At the Baroque Opera Festival in Znojmo she performed the coloratura role of Raffaelle in Haydn's oratorio Il ritorno di Tobia, and her artistic commitments took her then to Liège, Belgium, where she made her debut as Gilda. She opened the 2021/22 opera season with Violetta in Chisinau, Moldova and a gala concert in Odessa to celebrate the 30th anniversary of Ukraine‘s independence.
She has successfully participated in many singing competitions, including the Nico Dostal Competition in Korneuburg near Vienna and the Antonín Dvořák International Singing Competition in Karlovy Vary. She is also a laureate of the American International Czech & Slovak Voice Competition in the USA, the Bohuslav Martinů Foundation Competition, the Bologna International Vocal Competition, the Mimas Music Festival in Italy and the Opernspiele Munot Competition in Switzerland, where she was also engaged as Queen of the Night. In 2020 she won 2nd prize in the IFAC HANDA Australian Singing Competition. In 2021, she was the winner of the Nomea competition as The Best Opera Singer.