“My son, if I ask him, he always says: ‘I want to be like Ronaldo.’ And then if I ask my girl, she’ll say, ‘I want to be Lady Gaga and Beyoncé,’” the Bulgarian singer explained ahead of the premiere of Saturday’s new production of Giordano’s “Fedora” at the Metropolitan Opera. “They don’t really associate themselves with classical music artists. The times they Are a changing.”
In an attempt to shape the projects and bolster the opera’s audience, Yoncheva is launching her own record label.
Yoncheva, a Sony Classical artist since 2013, is releasing “The Courtesan” on her own label SY11 Productions, recorded with conductor Marco Armiliato, tenor Charles Castronovo and Italy’s Orchestra dell’Opera Carlo Felice Genova. It will launch on Amazon on February 9.
In a time of declining sales and classical music releases, he was able to choose the selections and even the cover photo, matters subject to a collaboration on Sony recordings.
“I never really had the opportunity to guide my project from the first step to the last step,” he said. “They were always a very good team with me, but I never felt free.”
In the first season almost normal since the start of the pandemic, Yoncheva sings a revival of Bellini’s “Norma” at the Met beginning February 28, then makes her debut as Maddalena di Coigny in Giordano’s “Andrea Chénier” at Milan’s Teatro alla Scala on May 3 and as Cio-Cio- San in “Madama Butterfly” by Puccini. ” at the Vienna State Opera on June 23.
“She is one of our most important artists,” Met general manager Peter Gelb said. “She is a wonderful actress and a great singer. She is the type of artist the Met needs more than ever these days as we try to make opera more appealing to a wider audience. She is extremely challenging because the main audience for the opera is much smaller than she was before.
Born in Plovdiv, Bulgaria, on Christmas Day 1981, Yoncheva attended William Christie’s “Jardin des Voix” in 2007 and moved to Switzerland to enroll at the Conservatoire de Musique de Genève.
“I wanted to come to the United States, but I never got a scholarship,” he said. “At that time, the salary of a normal Bulgarian person was $60 per month, so when you compare it to what you pay at a university in the United States, it is incredibly expensive, so I had to choose Europe. Someone gave me a little envelope with the name of the high school in Geneva on it, and this person said, ‘You should go there,’ and I said okay.”
In 2010, she became the first woman to win Plácido Domingo’s Operalia competition, and she made her debut at the Met and Royal Opera (2013), the Vienna State Opera (2014), the Teatro alla Scala in Milan, and Paris (2017). .
Yoncheva starred in Claus Guth’s 2017 Paris production of Puccini’s “La Bohème,” infamously relocated to a space shuttle.
“It was a nightmare,” he said with a laugh, “but a lot of people still talk about it.”
It has become more demanding with directors.
“Maybe they have a concept, that’s fine, but I want them to believe in it and be honest and tell me why,” he said. “I have to believe in that, and sometimes what happens is that they themselves don’t believe it and then they do it to provoke.”
David McVicar directs “Fedora” in his 13th Met production—a future staging of Ponchielli’s “La Gioconda” is scheduled—in a rather traditional production. Yoncheva made her debut as herself at La Scala on October 15 in a production of Modern Clothes directed by Mario Martone, and she was concerned about being heard.
“The stage manager decided to leave the entire stage empty. Roberto Alagna and I were fighting all night to find the Callas Point, the Caballé Point, the Tebaldi Point, the Point I don’t know who,” said Yoncheva, referring to the so-called preferential places on the stage of Maria Callas, Montserrat Caballe Y Renata Tebaldi decades earlier.
“I finished production and I was like, ‘Oh my gosh! What am I going to do at the Met? because the Met is maybe three times bigger than La Scala,” Yoncheva said. “I immediately called David and said, ‘Please tell me there are some walls.’ And he said yes. He showed me photos and I calmed down ”.
Its male lead at the Met is the tenor Piotr Beczala. They have worked together for a decade.
“Our voices are pretty similar,” Beczala said. “I come from the lyrical corner and she comes from the lyrical corner, arriving now for a little more spinto repertoire”.
While the Met dropped plans to feature Yoncheva in John Corigliano’s “The Ghosts of Versailles” and “Madama Butterfly,” she has committed to a new production of Verdi’s “Un Ballo in Maschera (A Masked Ball)” and reruns. from “Pique Dame” by Tchaikovsky. (The Queen of Spades)” and “Medea” by Cherubini in Italian.
She lives on the outskirts of Geneva with her husband, conductor Domingo Hindoyan, whom she met at school. They are occupied by her son Mateo, 8 years old, and her daughter Sofía, 3 years old, and the whole family travels to New York for their extended stay.
Yoncheva’s daughter sees her career somewhat differently than the opera audience.
“I ask her what dad does and she starts directing,” Yoncheva said. “And then I ask her what mommy is doing and she’s like, ‘Oh, mommy, she’s Elsa from ‘Frozen,’ because I’m dressed like a princess and I’m singing.”
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