According to critics, lyric-dramatic soprano Zarina Abaeva is one of the most
outstanding artists of her generation.
Since 2012 she has been a soloist of the Perm Opera and Ballet Theatre and since
2019 a guest soloist of the Moscow Novaya Opera Theatre.
In 2019, she received widespread critical acclaim for her triumphant performance of
the soprano part in Verdi's Requiem with the musicAeterna Orchestra under the
direction of Teodor Currentzis. She performed at such venues as the Paris
Philharmonic, the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg, the Konzerthaus in Vienna, the
Cologne Philharmonie, as well as at St. Mark's Cathedral in Milan, where a television
broadcast was recorded for the Mezzo and Medici TV channels. In the same year,
Zarina was invited to the Lucerne Festival and the Aix-en-Provence Festival. Later,
she brilliantly performed with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra in Berlin and made
her debut in New York and Tokyo.
Among the bright productions with Zarina Abaeva there are Honegger's Jeanne d'Arc
au bûcher (as the Virgin Mary) by Romeo Castellucci, Puccini's La Bohème (as Mimi)
directed by Philipp Himmelmann in Baden-Baden, and Katerina Evangelatos's
staging of The Tales of Hoffmann (as Antonia).
She has performed under the musical direction of such outstanding conductors as
Teodor Currentzis, Mikhail Pletnev, Antonio Pirolli, Pavel Kogan, Valentin Uryupin,
Andres Mustonen, Michiyoshi Inoue, Daniel Oren, and Graeme Jenkins.
Zarina's repertoire includes such roles as Butterfly (Madame Butterfly), Mimi (La
Bohème), Aida (Aida), Desdemona (Otello), Michaela (Carmen), Tatiana (Eugene
Onegin), Iolanta (Iolanta), Maria (Mazeppa), Agnes Sorel (The Maid of Orleans), the
Virgin Mary (Jeanne d'Arc au bûcher), Sister Angelica (Sister Angelica), Katya (The
Passenger), Blanche (Dialogues of the Carmelites), Gorislava (Ruslan and
Lyudmila), Ninetta (Love for Three Oranges), Natasha (The Mermaid), Antonia (The
Tales of Hoffmann), Wally (Wally), Soprano in Verdi's Requiem, Soprano in Stabat
mater by Rossini, Soprano in Te Deum by Bruckner, Soprano in Symphony No. 14
by Shostakovich.
This season Zarina sang the Butterfly part in Madame Butterfly at the Opera House
of Bologna under the baton of Daniel Oren.
In the spring of 2023, she made her debut with great success in the role of
Desdemona in Otello at the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino Theatre under the direction
of Maestro Zubin Mehta.