User:Dr. Stephan Poen/Mariana Nicolesco

Mariana Nicolesco (born November 28, 1948) is a Romanian operatic soprano.

Career
Mariana Nicolesco studied violin at the Music High School in Brasov and voice at the Cluj-Napoca Conservatory of Music, before winning a scholarship at the Conservatorio di Santa Cecilia in Rome, where she studied canto with Jolanda Magnoni. Later she worked with Rodolfo Celletti and Elisabeth Schwarzkopf. Upon graduation, in 1972, she won the Rossini International Voice Competition in Milan and American conductor Thomas Schippers invited her to Cincinnati, as Mimi in Puccini’s La Bohème. She made her debut at the Metropolitan Opera in New York in 1978, as Violetta in Verdi’s La Traviata, a role she has reprised over 200 times, later singing Nedda in Leoncavallo's I Pagliacci (1978-1986) and Gilda in Verdi's Rigoletto (1978). Soprano Mariana Nicolesco sang in major opera houses such as Teatro alla Scala in Milan, where she appeared in the world premiere of Luciano Berio’s La Vera Storia in 1982 and later in: The Stone Guest by Dargomyzhsky (1983), Lucio Silla by Mozart (1984), Polish Requiem by Penderecki(1985), L'Orfeo by Luigi Rossi (1985), Un re in ascolto by Luciano Berio (1986), Don Giovanni by Mozart (1987, 1988, 1993), Fetonte by Jommelli (1988), Alcyone and Alyssa by Ravel (1990). Mariana Nicolesco interpreted a wide repertoire from baroque, belcanto to verismo and contemporary music, and has been described as "an arresting personality with a vibrant voice" Highlights of her repertory are the roles of Elettra in Idomeneo, Vitellia in La clemenza di Tito by Mozart, Beatrice di Tenda by Bellini, Anna Bolena, Maria Stuarda, Queen Elisabeth I in Roberto Devereux, Maria di Rohan by Donizetti, Amelia in Simon Boccanegra, Desdemona in Otello, Leonora in Il Trovatore, Luisa in Luisa Miller by Verdi, Marguérite in Faust by Gounod, Tatyana in Evghenij Oneghin by Tchaikovsky, Liù in Turandot by Puccini, Zarina Marina in Dimitry by Dvorak. Invited by Pope John Paul II, she sang in the First Christmas Concert in the Vatican (1993) and participated in the world premiere of Krzysztof Penderecki’s Seven Gates of Jerusalem (Symphony N° 7) in 1997.

She returned to Romania in 1991, after the fall of the Communist regime, singing for the first time on a stage in her native country, in a Concert at the Romanian Atheneum. She created the Romanian Atheneum International Foundation. She initiated in 1995 the Hariclea Darclée International Voice Competition and Festival. In the years between an edition of the contest and the next, she offers Master Classes to the young artists. Mariana Nicolesco created the Romanian National Festival and Song Competition (2003) and presented for the International George Enescu Year, proclamed by UNESCO (2005), in world première the composer's complete songs in Japan, at Aichi World Exhibition as well as in Nagoya and Tokyo, in Prague, Paris, Rome and New York.

An honorary member of the Romanian Academy since 1993, Officer of the Order of the Arts and Letters in France (2000) ), she was awarded the Order of the Star of Italian Solidarity (2004) and the National Order of the Star of Romania in the Rank of Grand Cross (2008) . She was also named UNESCO Artist for Peace (2005) and was conferred the Special Award Kultur Preis Europa Medal in Sibiu, European Capital of Culture, 2007).