THE HIBLA
GERZMAVA

Opera Singers and Accompanists Competition

CHAIRMAN OF THE JURY

Hibla Gerzmava is one of the most sought-after singers of our time, performing at the world’s leading opera houses: the Metropolitan Opera, La Scala, the Covent Garden, the Paris National Opera, the Arena di Verona, the Bolshoi Theatre of Russia, the Mariinsky Theatre, and others. An accomplished musician and gifted actress, Hibla has an infallible instinct for a directorial pursuit. The singer’s creative path, her work with various stage directors, conductors and solo partners, her performances at not only opera houses but also at the major concert halls and her authority in the world of music set an example for young singers. Today Hibla Gerzmava is not just an opera singer, she is an associate professor of solo singing at the Moscow Conservatory, a friend and mentor to young soloists, President of Onegin National Opera Award, and the founder and director of the music festival “Hibla Gerzmava Invites...”. This festival is a major artistic event in Russia and abroad, and it is always welcomed at the world’s major concert halls from the Carnegie Hall in New York City and the Vienna Musikverein to the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory.

The Competition for young opera singers, initiated by Hibla Gerzmava, is not only a new creative step for the singer, but also an extension of her human aspirations: to help, to care, to devote herself and her love to people.

Born and raised in Milan, after graduating in Literature, he has been working since 1996 in Opera Management and in 2003 opened his own Agency after some years assisting Giuseppe Oldani, one of Italy’s oldest and most respected Agencies. Since 2010 he’s partner and founder of InArt. He regularly takes part at juries in International Competitions, and teaches young singers from Academies and Conservatories about the Agent’s work and the overall Opera business as is structured today.

rn in Milan in 1977. He pursued a professional education that led him to a degree in International Relations, to which he simultaneously combined his musical studies to deepen and complement his passion for opera. At the age of 24, he began his professional experience as a manager, which led him to realise his dream of working for some of the greatest artists on the international scene and with the world’s leading opera houses.

 In 2011, he founded the agency that bears his name: Ariosi Management. Since then, he has the privilege of guiding established artists, working to launch rising young talents and gradually opening up his perspectives to event organisation. Alessandro personally follows the career of each of his artists, thus realising his professional aspiration: to combine his passion for opera with the management of his artists. He carefully supervises their career development, seeking to fulfil the aspirations and unique characteristics of each and every one of them, and establishing relationships with theatres and promoters on an international scale, with the aim of bringing out the full potential of each of his artists.

Dmitry Bertman was born in Moscow, graduated from the Russian Academy of Theatre Arts as Opera Stage Director. In 1990 at the age of 23 he founded Helikon-Opera in Moscow, which soon became one of the most famous Russian opera brands. He has staged more than hundred productions, including a number of Russian and world premieres. As stage director he collaborated with such theatre companies, as Royal Swedish Opera, Liceu Opera Barcelona, Canadian Opera Company, Mariinsky Theatre, Teatro dell’Opera di Roma, Deutsche Oper am Rhein, Finnish National opera, National Theatre Mannheim, Latvian National Opera, Estonia Theatre, New Zealand Opera, Opera de Massy, Opéra National de Bordeaux, New National Theatre Tokyo among others.

He is the People’s Artist of the Russian Federation (2005), winner of the «Golden Mask» National Theatre Prize, Award «Gvozd Sezona», Stanislavsky Prize, Moscow City Government Prize, State Prize of Estonia. He has been awarded the Order of Friendship and the Order of Academic Palms (Officer).

He is the professor (chairman of department) at Russian Academy of Theatre Arts. His productions were included in the festival programs in Wexford (Ireland), Ludwigsburg (Germany), Merida and Santander (Spain), Radio France Festival (France), Ravenna Festival (Italy), Saaremaa Opera festival (Estonia).

Dmitry Vdovin is a founder, artistic director and voice teacher of the Young Artist Program of the Bolshoi Theatre of Russia.

He started his pedagogical career at the Gnessins State College of music, where later he became the head of the vocal department. He was a voice teacher at the Russian Academy of music, then the chair of the vocal department at the State Choral Academy, where he is still a professor of the voice.

Was invited as a guest teacher to the Young Artist Program/Studio: Houston Grand Opera, Zürich Opera, Metropolitan Opera (Lindemann YADP), Wiener Staatsoper, Opera di Roma, Dutch National Opera, Teatr Wielki in Warsaw, Stuttgart Staatsoper, Latvian and Lithuanian National Operas, Bregenz Opera Festival.

Mr. Vdovin has given master classes all over Russia as well as in the USA and Europe. He has been the jury member of the prestigious vocal competitions. Mr.Vdovin’s students became the principal artists at the renowned opera houses such a Metropolitan Opera, La Scala, Opera de Paris, Royal Covent Garden, Wiener Staatsoper.

Honored Master of Arts of Russia, Cavaliere dell’Ordine al merito della Repubblica Italiana, winner of National Opera Award «Onegin» and «Casta Diva» in the category «Knight of the Opera».

In 1980, she completed her studies at the Tallin Conservatoire in piano. In 1986, graduated from the faculty of opera directing at the Rimsky-Korsakov Leningrad State Conservatoire (specialising in music theatre directing). In 2000, she obtained a degree in Business management from Bramson ORT College.

As a director, she collaborated with theatres in Estonia, Ukraine, Russia, Slovakia, USA and Israel. Amongst the performances she staged are Dido and Aeneas by H. Purcell, Le Nozze di Figaro and Così fan tutte by W.A. Mozart, Don Pasquale by G. Donizetti, La Cenerentola by G.Rossini, La Traviata by G. Verdi etc.

From 1987 to 2019, she taught at several institutions, as part of youth opera programmes and festivals in the USA and Europe.

For many years, she has represented Russia in juries of international vocal competitions, such as the Queen Sonja Competition (Oslo), the Hans Gabor Belvedere Competition (Vienna), the opera competition in Portofino (Italy), the Georg Ots Competition (St Petersburg) and the Sobinov Competition (Yaroslavl) etc.

Between 2009 and 2016 – Director of the opera troupe of the Mikhailovsky Theatre in St Petersburg.

Since 2016 – has been Casting Director of the opera troupe of the Bolshoi Theatre.

Accompanist, Honoured Artist of Russia, Recipient of the Medal of the Order for Services to the Fatherland, 1st class and the National Opera award Onegin.

In 1980, three years after graduating from the conservatory, Irina Soboleva was invited to join the Mariinsky Theatre as an opera concert mistress. Productions she worked on include The Queen of Spades, Eugene Onegin, Sadko, Ruslan and Lyudmila, Prince Igor, Mazepa, The Enchantress, The Tsar’s Bride, Boris Godunov, War and Peace, Semyon Kotko, Katerina Ismailova, The Nose, Aida, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream, as well as many others. In close collaboration with the composer Rodion Shchedrin she worked on the world premieres of his operas The Lefthander (2013) and A Christmas Tale (2015) and the St. Petersburg premiere of the opera Lolita (2020). Irina Soboleva has performed with the Mariinsky Theatre troupe in Germany, Italy, Portugal, France, Japan, Israel, and the USA. Irina Soboleva participated in the Stars of the White Nights festival in St Petersburg, the Moscow Easter Festival, the Mikkeli Festival, and the Gergiev Festival in Rotterdam.

Since 2012 she has taught at the Rimsky- Korsakov St. Petersburg State Conservatory, Department of Concert Mastership. She is a jury member for several international competitions and convenes masterclasses.

Since September 2021 she has been Artistic Director of the Opera Company of the Primorsky Stage of the Mariinsky Theatre.

Artistic Director and Chief Director of Opera in the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Moscow Academic Music Theatre. People’s Artist
of the Russian Federation, USSR State Prize winner, Moscow Prize winner, professor.

Born in Tashkent. In 1980 Alexander graduated the Russian Academy of Theatre Arts (Lev Mikhailov’s class). Between 1980 and 1991 he was Chief Director of the Sverdlovsk (now Yekaterinburg) Opera and Ballet Theatre. Since 1991 he has been Artistic Director and Chief Director of Opera in the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Moscow Academic Music Theatre. Among his productions in the Theatre are M.I. Glinka’s Ruslan and Lyudmila, N.A. Rimsky-Korsakov’s The Tale of Tsar Saltan, The Golden Cockerel and May Night, P.I. Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin and The Queen of Spades, M.P. Mussorgsky’s Khovanshchina, S.S. Prokofiev’s Betrothal in a Monastery, War and Peace
and The Love for Three Oranges, J. Strauss’ Die Fledermaus, J. Offenbach’s Robinson Crusoé and many others.

Alexander Titel produced the world premieres of operas The Prophet by V.A. Kobekin (conducted by Yevgeny Brazhnik, sets by Yuri Ustinov and Ernst Heidebrecht), The Gambler by S.S. Prokofiev in the first version (conducted by Gennady Rozhdestvensky, sets by David Borovsky, The Bolshoi Theatre), Hamlet by V.A. Kobekin (conducted by Felix Korobov, sets by Ernst Heidebrecht), and The Devil in Love by A.K. Wustin (conducted by Vladimir Jurowski, sets by Vladimir Arefiev), the last two at the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Music Theatre.

He staged a total of about 70 productions in Russia and abroad.

Vasco Fracanzani grew up in an Italian Spanish family and first started his musical studies abroad. He subsequently studied singing at the Giuseppe Verdi conservatory in Milan and has sung professionally in Italy, Spain, England and Germany.

In 2010 he won the auditions and has been was a member of the Teatro Real chorus until 2016, moment in which he transitioned into the field of artistic management.

As an opera singer and subsequently in management he has had the possibility and pleasure and honor to work with, observe and follow the paths of many distinguished music international professionals and venues (conductors, stage and theater directors, theater managers,
agents and venues), a profound and highly enriching experience.

Director General of the Moscow Philharmonic Society

Alexey Shalashov graduated from the Moscow State Tchaikovsky Conservatory (violin class of Prof.Maya Glezarova). From 1976 to 2002, he worked at the USSR State Radio and Television Symphony Orchestra (now Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra), first as a performer, then as a concertmaster, then, for the last five years, also as its Director. In 1997 he was conferred the title of Honoured Artist of the Russian Federation.
As the Director of the Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra, he was involved in arranging over 30 records, releasing dozens of video films and holding over 300 concerts and festivals throughout Russia, Austria, Germany, Japan, Switzerland, UK, and US.

Since 2003, Alexey Shalashov has been Director General of the Moscow Philharmonic Society. From 2008 to 2012, he headed the Department of State Support for Art and Folk Art at the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation, and in May 2012 he returned to his former post at the Moscow Philharmonic.

He was awarded the Prize of the Government of the Russian Federation for his contribution to national culture (2014), the Russian Order of Honour (2017) and the French Order of Arts and Letters (2019).

Honoured Artist of the RSFSR, Professor of the Tchaikovsky Moscow State Conservatory, opera concert mistress of the Moscow Stanislavsky and the Nemirovich-Danchenko Moscow Music Theatre. In 1965 she graduated from the Piano Department of the Urals Mussorgsky State Conservatoire. From 1964 she was a concert mistress of the Sverdlovsk Opera Theatre, from 1965 she acted as the chief concert mistress. In 1976 Evgenia Arefieva was invited to teach at the Urals State Conservatoire, where she taught a chamber singing class at the Solo Singing Department, as well as the accompanist class at the Chamber Music Department.

Since 1991 Arefieva taught a vocal ensemble class at the Moscow Conservatoire at the Solo Singing Department. The students of her class became laureates of international and all-Russian contests of vocal ensembles Bella Voce and Festos many times. She was a jury member
of the Glinka International Vocal Competition (Chelyabinsk, November 2007). Since 1992 Evgenia Arefieva has been an opera concert mistress at the Moscow Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Moscow Music Theatre. She has participated in the productions of operas like La Bohème, Carmen, La Forza del Destino, The Tales of Hoffmann, L’Elisir d’Amore, L’Italiana in Algeri, La Traviata, Medea, Manon, and others.

Evgenia Arefieva prepared programmes for the 10th Tchaikovsky Competition with Hibla Gerzmava (Grand Prix, 1994). She subsequently worked on all parts with Hibla Gerzmava for productions at the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Theatre, at Covent Garden, Metropolitan Opera, and the Vienna Staatsoper.

People’s Artist of Russia and of the Republic of Northern
Ossetia-Alania.

Artistic Director of the Mariinsky Academy of Young Opera Singers, the State Opera and Ballet Theatre of the Republic of Northern Ossetia-Alania (Vladikavkaz), and the Digora State Drama Theatre. She is one of the finest vocal accompanists as well as the director and a member
of juries of numerous prestigious international vocal competitions.

During her artistic career, Larisa Gergieva has trained ninety-six laureates of all-Union, all-Russian and international competitions. Her repertoire includes over one hundred operas which she has rehearsed for various theatres throughout the world.

Larisa Gergieva heads the Rimsky-Korsakov, Pavel Lisitsian and Elena Obraztsova International Competitions, Opera without Borders, the All-Russian Vocalists Competition named after Nadezhda Obukhova, the Larisa Gergieva and Guests International Festival and the Art-Solo Mono-performance Festival (Vladikavkaz).

She worked as a coach in the largest theatres in the world – Metropolitan Opera, La Scala, Covent Garden, Tokyo Opera House, as well as in the theatres of San Francisco, Florence, and Paris.

She has recorded twenty-three compact-discs with acclaimed singers including Olga Borodina, Valentina Tsydypova, Galina Gorchakova, Lyudmila Shemchuk, Georgy Zastavny and Grayr Khanedanian.

Honoured Artist of the Republic Abkhazia

Born into a family of musicians in Sverdlovsk, she graduated with a gold medal from the Specialised Music School of the Ural Conservatoire. In 1993 she graduated from the Moscow Conservatoire in the class of special piano (under V. Gornostayeva), and in 1995 she completed
her postgraduate course in concertmaster studies with distinction (supervised by Professor M. Smirnov).

Under Professor M.E. Shenderovich she tried herself as a concert mistress, and in 1993 started working at the Moscow Conservatoire, at the Department of Solo Singing. Since 2008 Ganelina has taught at the Concertmaster Department of the Moscow Conservatoire, and she is now an associate professor at the Department of Solo Singing.

Her creative alliance bonds Ekaterina Ganelina with singer Hibla Gerzmava. Their joint solo concerts have been staged to great acclaim in cities across Russia, France, Great Britain, the Netherlands, Turkey, Japan, and the USA. Several CDs have been produced in recording studios. In October 2015, the creative duo Gerzmava-Ganelina made their debut at New York acclaimed Carnegie Hall.

Ganelina took part in international vocal competitions: the Tchaikovsky Competition (Moscow, 1994), the Rimsky-Korsakov Competition (St.Petersburg, 1993), the Bella Voce Competition (Moscow, 1999 and 2001) and the Amber Nightingale Competition (Kaliningrad, 2002). She was also invited as concertmaster of the Placido Domingo’s Operalia Competition (Madrid, 1995).

Elena Fedorenko was born in Veliky Novgorod. In 2012, she graduated from the St Petersburg State Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatoire.

Since 2013 Fedorenko has been Concert Mistress of the Mariinsky Academy of Young Opera Singers.

As a pianist and accompanist, Elena regularly appears at the theatre’s chamber venues in vocal concerts, as well as in productions for general audiences. She has appeared in concerts in Italy, the United Kingdom, France, and Finland.

In 2011, Elena was a prize-winner of the International Stanisław Moniuszko Competition in Paris. She received diplomas as best concert mistress at the International Elena Obraztsova Competition (St Petersburg, 2016), the International Rimsky-Korsakov Competition (Tikhvin, 2016 and 2018), the International Sobinov Vocal Competition (Yaroslavl, 2018), and the International Chaliapin Vocal Competition (Ufa, 2018)