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The Italian soprano, Gemma Bertagnolli, started her career very young, winning various national and international competitions, including AsLiCo Competition and Francesco Viñas Competition (special prize for the best W.A. Mozart interpretation).
Gemma Bertagnolli made her operatic debut at a very young age. She has developed an international reputation as one of the most accomplished singers of Baroque and Classical music of her generation. Her career has taken her to major Theatres and Festivals worldwide such as Salzburg Festival, Florence’s Maggio Musicale, Milan’s Teatro alla Scala, Torino’s Teatro Regio, Bologna’s Teatro Comunale, Pesaro Rossini Festival, Opernhaus Zürich, Berlin Staatsoper, Rome’s Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, Paris’s Théâtre Champs Elysées, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Munich Bayerische Staatsoper, Bruxelles Palais des Beaux Arts, Festivals de Montpellier-Radio France, Beaune, La Coruna Festival Mozart, Potsdam Musikfestspiele Sanssouci.
Conductors with whom Gemma Bertagnolli has worked in opera and concert include Roberto Abbado, Semyon Bychkov, Daniele Gatti, Gianandrea Gavazzeni, Gianluigi Gelmetti, Fabio Luisi, Lorin Maazel, Zubin Mehta, Ennio Morricone, Riccardo Muti, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Simone Young, Jonathan Webb.
It is above all as a singer of Baroque Music that Gemma Bertagnolli is most celebrated and she is currently considered one of the performers of her generation of reference for the Italian Baroque Music. As a specialist in the Baroque repertoire, she has worked with the major ensembles on period instruments and their conductors, including Concerto Italiano (Director: Rinaldo Alessandrini), Giovanni Antonini/Il Giardino Armonico, Alfredo Bernardini/Zefiro, Fabio Biondi/Europa Galante, Ivor Bolton, Christophe Coin, Ottavio Dantone/Accademia Bizantina, Diego Fasolis, René Jacobs, Ton Koopman, Alessandro de Marchi/Academia Montis Regalis, Trevor Pinnock, Christina Pluhar, Christophe Rousset, Andreas Spering, Jean-Christophe Spinosi, and with orchestras such as Freiburger Barockorchester, Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin.
In addition to a vast concert repertoire, which ranges from J.S. Bach, George Frideric Handel, Giovanni Battista Pergolesi to W.A. Mozart's whole sacred works, the Ninth Symphony of L.v. Beethoven and the Second and Fourth Symphonies of Gustav Mahler, her operatic repertoire includes the roles of Sophie in R. Strauss’ Rosenkavalier, Amenaide in Rossini’s Tancredi, and W.A. Mozart’s Pamina in Die Zauberflöte, Ismene in Mitridate, Susanna in Le nozze di Figaro.
Gemma Bertagnolli’s passion for the Baroque repertoire led her to performe roles like Emira in Johann Adolf Hasse´s Solimano under René Jacobs at the Staatsoper unter den Linden in Berlin; Nerone in G.F. Handel´s Agrippina and Maddalena in La Resurrezione with Il Giardino Armonico conducted by Giovanni Antonini at the Styriarte Festival; Aristea in Giovanni Battista Pergolesi´s L’Olimpiade under Ottavio Dantone at Festival Pergolesi in Jesi and at the Ravenna Festival; Piacere in G.F. Handel´s Il trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno with Concerto Italiano conducted by Rinaldo Alessandrini, and under the conduction of Marc Minkowski at the Opernhaus Zürich; Rosane in Antonio Vivaldi´s La verità in cimento with the Ensemble Matheus conducted by Jean-Christophe Spinosi; Ersilla in Orlando finto pazzo; Megacle in A. Vivaldi´s L´Olimpiade at the Théâtre des Champs Elysées and at the Teatro Regio di Torino with the Academia Montis Regalis. She sung Il ritorno di Ulisse in patria and L'incoronazione di Poppea under the conduction of Ivor Bolton and the stage direction of Luca Ronconi at Maggio Musicale Fiorentino; L'incoronazione di Poppea under the conduction of Rinaldo Alessandrini and the stage direction of Graham Vick at the Teatro Comunale di Bologna, and under the conduction of Ottavio Dantone in the theatres of Cremona, Como, Ferrara and Pavia.
Highlights on the concert stage are the complete W.A. Mozart´s sacred works with the Orchestra da Camera di Mantova conducted by Umberto Benedetti Michelangeli, Gustav Mahler´s Symphony No. 4 at the Rai Turin and the intense collaboration with Antonio Ballista.
Baroque takes the main place in Gemma Bertagnolli’s vast discography, which includes part of the Naïve Vivaldi Edition with great critical acclaim (Gramophone Awards, Choc du Monde de la Musique, Timbre de Platine d’Opéra International), in addition to the collaborations on the borders of gender with Ennio Morricone and Dulce Pontes, or recitals with piano (Lieder by W.A. Mozart, Chamber Lyrics by Ottorino Respighi). Her latest recordings include G.F. Handel’s Venus and Adonis Cantatas and Sonatas with Ensemble Zefiro (Director: Alfredo Bernardini) for Deutsche Harmonia Mundi (2009), Alessandro Scarlatti’s Nisi Dominus and Salve Regina for CPO (2010), Baroque Passionate Arias for Brilliant Classics (2010), “Christmas at San Marco” with Vocal Concert Dresden/Peter Kopp for Edel Berlin Classics (2010), Cantate e Sonate by B.Vinaccesi for Stradivarius.
Gemma Bertagnolli is also an acclaimed voice teacher. Among the singers who have studied with her and/or attended her master-classes: Sara Tommasini (Contralto/Mezzo-soprano).She is UNICEF Ambassador and a passionate activist for the role of the music in the civil society. |
