PI0TR BECZALA, Tenor:

As a consequence of his frequent presence at the leading opera-houses of the world as well as of the overwhelming appreciation of audience, press and media Piotr Beczala is reputed worldwide to be one of the leading lyric tenors of our time. In 2010 he performed as Rodolfo in Puccini's "La Bohème" with the Royal Opera House Covent Garden in London, the San Diego Opera, the New York Metropolitan Opera and the Vienna State Opera, as Lensky in Tchaikovsky's "Eugene Onegin", Prince in Dvorak's "Rusalka" and Alfredo in Verdi's "La Traviata" with the Zurich Opera, as Edgardo in Donizetti's "Lucia di Lammermoor" with the Hamburg State Opera and the Mariinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg and as Jenik in Smetana's "Prodana Nevesta" with the Paris Opéra National. Furthermore Salzburg Festival heard his role debut as Roméo in Gounod's "Roméo et Juliette", a part he meanwhile also sang in London and which the Met hears him in 2011; with this company he will be touring Japan (Rodolfo, Edgardo) this year. Futhermore he is also singing Edgardo with the Vienna State Opera in 2011 as well as Gustavo in Verdi's "Un ballo in maschera" with the Zurich Opera, the Prince in "Rusalka" in Munich, Gounod's "Faust" when making his debut with the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona, Alfredo at London's Covent Garden and Tchaikovsky's "Iolanta" within Salzburg Festival 2011.

Piotr Beczala has been performing with the following theatres: De Nederlandse Opera Amsterdam, Théâtre Royal La Monnaie in Brussels, Opéra National de Paris, Bilbao Opera, Cologne Opera, Hamburg State Opera, Frankfurt Opera, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Berlin State Opera Unter den Linden, Vienna State Opera, Zurich Opera, Grand Théâtre de Geneva, Teatro alla Scala di Milano, Teatro Comunale di Bologna, Megaron in Athens, Teatr Wielki Warsaw, Mariinsky Theatre St. Petersburg, Royal Opera House Covent Garden London and the San Francisco Opera, Chicago Lyric Opera and Metropolitan Opera New York. Furthermore guest appearances led him regularly to the most important international festivals: Salzburg Festival, Vienna Festival Weeks, Vienna Klangbogen Festival, Styriarte Graz, Bad Kissingen Festival, Zurich Festival, Lucerne Festival, Montpellier Festival, Festival de Saint Denis, a. o. Concert engagements made him appear at the Berlin Philharmonic Hall, Munich Philharmonic Hall, the Munich Herkulessaal, the Vienna Musikverein, the Vienna Konzerthaus, the Zurich Tonhalle, the KKL Lucerne, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Moscow Tchaikovsky-Conservatory and at the Severance Hall in Cleveland.

Piotr Beczala's stage repertoire consists mostly of the lyric tenor roles of the canonic operatic repertoire: Alfredo ("La Traviata"/Verdi), Duca di Mantova ("Rigoletto"/Verdi), Riccardo ("Un ballo in maschera"/Verdi), Edgardo ("Lucia di Lammermoor"/Donizetti), Rodolfo ("La Bohème"/Puccini), "Werther" (Massenet), "Faust" (Gounod), Roméo ("Roméo et Juliette"/Gounod), Prince ("Rusalka"/Dvorak), Lensky ("Eugene Onegin"/Tchaikovsky), Vaudémont ("Iolanta"/ Tchaikovsky), Jenik ("The Bartered Bride"/Smetana), Shepard ("Król Roger"/Szymanowski), Tamino ("The Magic Flute"/Mozart), Don Ottavio ("Don Giovanni"/Mozart), Orombello ("Beatrice di Tenda"/Bellini), Italian Singer ("Der Rosenkavalier"/R. Strauss) and Camille de Rosillon ("The Merry Widow"/Lehár). Upcoming new challenges include Des Grieux in "Manon" (Massenet) as well as the title-role in "Les contes d'Hoffmann" (Offenbach) a. o.

Born in Southern Poland Piotr Beczala received his first vocal education in Kattowice. Among his vocal teachers one will find names like Jan Ballarin, Pavel Lisizian, Sena Jurinac and Dale Fundling. After his first engagement at the Landestheater Linz (Austria) he switched to the Zurich Opera in 1997 where he sang - besides the already mentioned parts - numerous further roles: Tristan ("Le Vin Herbé"/Martin), Steva ("Jenufa"/Janacek), Synodal ("The Demon"/Rubinstein), Walther von der Vogelweide ("Tannhäuser"/Wagner), Arnim von Grübben ("Simplicius"/Joh. Strauß), Matteo ("Arabella"/R. Strauss), Elvino ("La Sonnambula"/Bellini) and Belmonte ("The Abduction from the Seraglio"/Mozart). After being a permanent member of the Zurich Opera for some years Piotr Beczala remained closely associated to this company.

His wide concert repertoire ranges from Mozart's, Cherubini's and Schubert's sacred music, Haydn's oratorios, Beethoven's "Missa Solemnis" and Ninth Symphony, Schumann's "Paradies und die Peri", Rossini's "Stabat Mater" and "Petite Messe Solennelle", Berlioz’s "Roméo et Juliette" and "Requiem", Bruckner's "Te Deum", Dvorak's "Stabat Mater" and "Requiem" and Brahms's "Rinaldo" to Verdi's "Messa da Requiem" as well as Mahler's "Das Lied von der Erde" and "Das klagende Lied".

In concert and opera Piotr Beczala has worked closely with numerous renown conductors: Gerd Albrecht, Marco Armiliato, Jirí Belohlavek, Maurizio Benini, Bertrand de Billy, Michael Boder, Ivor Bolton, Richard Bonynge, Frans Brüggen, Semyon Bychkov, Sylvain Cambreling, Paolo Carignani, Sir Andrew Davis, Edo de Waart, Plácido Domingo, Vladimir Fedosejev, Ivan Fischer, Patrick Fournillier, Valery Gergiev, Michael Gielen, Carlo Mario Giulini, Hartmut Haenchen, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Philippe Herreweghe, Marek Janowski, Mariss Jansons, Philippe Jordan, Michail Jurowski, Vladimir Jurowski, Ton Koopman, Nicola Luisotti, Zubin Mehta, Ingo Metzmacher, Riccardo Muti, Kent Nagano, Andris Nelsons, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Renato Palumbo, Antonio Pappano, Trevor Pinnock, Carlo Rizzi, Donald Runnicles, Nello Santi, Peter Schneider, Martin Sieghart, Christian Thielemann, Marcello Viotti, Franz Welser Möst, Simone Young and Alberto Zedda.

Piotr Beczala's CD-recitals "Salut" with French and Italian arias (2008) and "Slavic" with selections from Slavic operas (2010) were released by 'Orfeo' being highly acclaimed by the international press. Furthermore the artist can be heard on the following CD-recordings: Mozart's "The Abduction from the Seraglio" ('Oehms Classics'), Dvorak's "Svata Ludmila" ('Orfeo'), Johann Strauß' "Simplicius" ('Emi'), Offenbach's "Die Rheinnixen" and Szymanowski's "Król Roger" ('Accord'), Tchaikovsky's "Iolanta" ('Relief'), Verdi's "La Traviata" ('Farao Classics'), Berlioz’s "Roméo et Juliette" (Edition ‘Hänssler') , Lehár's "The Land of Smiles" ('CPO'), Gounod's "Faust" ('Orfeo') as well as Songs by Karol Szymanowski ('Channel Classics') and a CD-release of the Berlin Aids-Gala 2009 ('RCA').

The following DVD-productions are available: From the Zurich Opera "Simplicius", "The Merry Widow", "La Traviata", "Rigoletto" and "The Magic Flute" (all on 'Arthaus'), "The Abduction from the Seraglio" ('Bel Air Media') and "Don Giovanni" ('EMI'), from Salzburg Festival 2004 resp. 2006 "Der Rosenkavalier" ('TDK') and "Don Giovanni" ('Decca'), from the Opéra National de Paris "The Magic Flute" ('TDK'), from Berlin's Deutsche Oper the Aids-Gala-Concert 2007 ('Arthaus') and from the Metropolitan Opera "Lucia di Lammermoor" ('DG'). Newest releases are converning Beethoven's Ninth ('Unitel') and Ioan Holender's Farewell Concert from the Vienna State Opera ('DG').

March 2011

Homepage: www.beczala.com