Raina Kabaivanska

Raina Kabaivanska Bulgarian ????? ??????????? born Raina Yakimova Bulgarian ??????? born 15 December 1934 is a Bulgarian opera singer one of the leading liricospinto sopranos of her generation particularly associated with Verdi and Puccini although she sang a wide range of roles Born in Burgas Bulgaria she studied in Sofia with Prokopova and Yosifov and made her debut at the Bulgarian National Opera in Sofia as Tatjana in Tchaikovskys Eugene Onegin in 1957 The following year she left for Italy for further studies with Zina FumagalliRiva in Milan and with Giulia Tess in Vercelli Two years later she made a breakthrough in Fano Italy as Nedda in Leoncavallos Pagliacci In 1961 she gave her first performance at La Scala in Milan as Agnese in Bellinis Beatrice di Tenda opposite Dame Joan Sutherland She sang widely in Italy Genoa Venice Parma and notably in Turin in 1973 as Elena in I vespri siciliani in the only production ever directed by Maria Callas In 1962 she made her debuts at both the Royal Opera House in London as Desdemona in Verdis Otello and the Metropolitan Opera in New York as Nedda She went on performing at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires the Paris Opéra the Vienna State Opera the Budapest Opera the Lyric Opera of Chicago the San Francisco Opera the Dallas Opera the Teatro dellOpera di Roma etc She also appeared in a few opera films notably Pagliacci opposite Jon Vickers in 1968 Il trovatore opposite Franco Bonisolli in 1975 and Tosca opposite Plácido Domingo in 1976 A versatile singer with a beautiful voice and fine musicianship she is also a singingactress of considerable ability Kabaivanska has received the following international opera awards Bellini 1965 Viotti dOro 1970 Puccini 1978 Illica 1979 Monteverdi 1980 the Award of Accademia Medici Lorenzo il Magnifico Florence 1990 the Grand Prix A Life Dedicated to the Music Venice 2000 Kabaivanska delivered an emotional performance of the Ave Maria from the opera Otello by Giuseppe Verdi to open the funeral mass for Luciano Pavarotti in Modena Italy on 8 September 2007 Kabaivanska has added another role to her considerable repertoire the Comtesse in Tchaikowskys Queen of Spades in a series of five performances 31 January 19 February 2008 at the Capitole de Toulouse She is a professor in Italy at the Accademia Musicale Chigiana in Siena at the VecchiTonelli Music Institute in Modena and at New Bulgarian University in Sofia She is also a jury member for many prestigious competitions all over the world Source Article Raina Kabaivanska from Wikipedia in English licensed under CCBYSA 30