Messa Da Requiem: Dies IraeRamón Vargas, Ferruccio Furlanetto, Olga Borodina, Violeta Urmana, Semyon Bychkov, WDR Symphony Orchestra, Cologne West German Radio Chorus, NDR Choir & Turin Radio Chorus
ALBUMWagner: SiegfriedRundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin, Christian Elsner, Stephen Gould, Marek Janowski, Tomasz Konieczny, Matti Salminen, Jochen Schmeckenbecher & Violeta Urmana
ALBUMGiordano: Andrea ChénierAndrea Bocelli, Violeta Urmana, Lucio Gallo, Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano Giuseppe Verdi & Marco Armiliato
ALBUMVerdi, G.: Messa Da RequiemRamón Vargas, Ferruccio Furlanetto, Olga Borodina, Violeta Urmana, WDR Symphony Orchestra, Cologne West German Radio Chorus, NDR Choir & Turin Radio Chorus
ALBUMBerlioz, H.: Grande Messe Des Morts - La Mort De Cleopatre - Le Carnaval RomainBertrand De Billy, Giuseppe Sabbatini, Chorus of the Vienna State Opera, Wiener Singakademie, Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra & Violeta Urmana
ALBUMLiszt, Strauss & Berg: LiederVioleta Urmana & Jan Philip Schulze
ALBUMMahler: LiederAnne Sofie von Otter, Pierre Boulez, Thomas Quasthoff, Violeta Urmana & Vienna Philharmonic
ALBUMPonchielli: La GiocondaMarcello Viotti, Plácido Domingo & Violeta Urmana
ALBUMVerdi: Il trovatoreRiccardo Muti, Orchestra del Teatro alla Scala, Coro della Scala, Violeta Urmana & Salvatore Licitra
ALBUMMahler: Das Lied von der ErdeMichael Schade, Pierre Boulez, Violeta Urmana & Vienna Philharmonic
ALBUMWagner: Love DuetsAntonio Pappano, Violeta Urmana, Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, Deborah Voigt & Plácido Domingo
Violeta Urmana's Popular Music Videos
Symphony No. 9 in D Minor, Op. 125 "Choral": IVd. Seid umschlungen, Millionen . Freude, schöner Götterfunken (Live at Philharmonie, Berlin / 2000)
Karita Mattila, Violeta Urmana, Thomas Moser, Eike Wilm Schulte, Swedish Radio Choir, Eric Ericson Chamber Choir, Berlin Philharmonic & Claudio Abbado
Symphony No. 9 in D Minor, Op. 125 "Choral": IVb. O Freunde, nicht diese Töne! . Freude, schöner Götterfunken (Live at Philharmonie, Berlin / 2000)
Karita Mattila, Violeta Urmana, Thomas Moser, Eike Wilm Schulte, Swedish Radio Choir, Eric Ericson Chamber Choir, Berlin Philharmonic & Claudio Abbado
Artist Biography
Violeta Urmana has taken an unusual path to stardom on the world's operatic stages: she first studied piano, and after taking up voice in her early twenties, she sang as a somewhat reluctant mezzo-soprano. But then, from about the age of 40, she began the transition to soprano, producing a lush voice, instantly striking in its bright tones and sheer power. It is not surprising that as a late-comer to vocal study, she made her major debuts relatively late: at Bayreuth and La Scala in the 1993-1994 season, at the Vienna State Opera in 1996, and the Met in 2001. Shortly after making her switch to soprano, Urmana pondered another, far more earth-shaking change in her career, when in 2004, urged by influential friends, she considered running for president of her native Lithuania, where she is enormously popular and highly respected. As a mezzo, Urmana was well known for her portrayal of Kundry in Wagner's Parsifal and Eboli in Verdi's Don Carlo. Her soprano roles include Iphigénie (Gluck's Iphigénie en Aulide), Isolde, Norma, Lady Macbeth (Verdi's Macbeth), Tosca, and many others. As a concert singer and recitalist, Urmana has sung a varied array of repertory from J.S. Bach to Schoenberg and Berg. She has appeared on numerous recordings for many major labels, including DG, Decca, EMI, and Sony.
Violeta Urmana (Urmanaviciute) was born in Kazlu Ruda, Lithuania, in 1961. From age seven she studied piano and later graduated from the Lithuanian Academy of Music in Vilnius as a talented, though, by her assessment, not committed pianist. After four years of local studies in voice (as a soprano), she relocated to Munich (1991) for studies with Josef Loibl. By 1993 she was gaining notice as a mezzo, but found her voice was more comfortable with higher mezzo roles, like Kundry. Following a vocally taxing performance of Azucena (Verdi's Il Trovatore) in 2000 at La Scala, she decided to become a soprano.
Urmana's major debuts as a soprano came when she sang Sieglinde (Wagner's Die Walkure) at the 2001 Bayreuth Festival and Iphigénie (Gluck's Iphigénie en Aulide) at La Scala in December 2002. Thereafter, she scored triumph after triumph with her new voice, including with her 2008 Isolde in Japan with the Opera Bastille, and 2010 appearance at the Met singing Odabella from Verdi's Attila. Among Urmana's more acclaimed recordings is the 2010 Decca issue of Giordano's Andrea Chénier, in which she sang Maddalena.