Photo: ©DECCA/Uli Weber
Many things are different when Cecilia Bartoli sings. Critics look for new metaphors because everyday vocabulary is not sufficient. It is said that her throat "must hide a nightingale’s nest" and in fact "declarations of love" are pure and simply appropriate … The Bartoli phenomenon. It can’t be expressed in down-to-earth language or in facts and figures. However they prove in their own way how much Cecilia Bartoli moves people with her music.
More than 10 million of her video and sound recordings have been sold worldwide. According to these figures, Cecilia Bartoli is currently the most successful classical artist. Her recordings occupied the top positions in the international pop charts for more than 100 weeks. As these facts show, Cecilia Bartoli is one of the most popular artists of our time.
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She manages this without the usual popularisation that pervades the market. The term "crossover" is defined differently by Cecilia Bartoli: they are the people who cross a bridge and share their passion and curiosity with it. Cecilia Bartoli is open to new discoveries and makes selective, well-thought-out projects into worldwide successes: "The Vivaldi Album", "Italian Arias" (Gluck), "The Salieri Album", "Opera proibita", "Maria", "Sacrificium", "Mission" and "St. Petersburg" have been awarded a large number of recording prizes, including five Grammys.
Her concerts have taken her to the most important concert halls in Europe, America, Asia and Australia. Most recently it has been the top ensembles of historical performance practice, which have accompanied her on her explorations, including the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, Les Arts Florissants, I Barocchisti, the Concentus Musicus Vienna, the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra, Il Giardino Armonico, the Basel Chamber orchestra, Les Musiciens du Louvre and the Zurich Orchestra La Scintilla. Naturally Cecilia Bartoli has also sung with many leading symphony orchestras. The highlights of this work were programmes, which she developed and performed with the Vienna Philharmonic.
In 2012 Cecilia Bartoli became the Artistic Director of the Salzburg Whitsun Festival. Her special ability to combine art and concept whilst bringing creativity from the context will find an ideal sphere of activity here. Cecilia Bartoli is the first woman to occupy this leading position in international cultural life.
Salzburg is now also an important location to showcase her opera singing. In 2013 Bartoli's stage debut as Norma took place here – a milestone in her career. She has already announced the electrifying news that she will make her debut as Maria in Bernstein’s "West Side Story" in 2016.
Major locations in her stage career so far have included the Metropolitan Opera New York, the Royal Opera House Covent Garden London, the Scala in Milan, the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, the Zürich Opera and the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées Paris. She celebrated a triumphant return as Desdemona in Rossini’s "Othello" there in 2014.
Cecilia Bartoli was 19 years old when she made her debut in Rossini’s "Barbiere di Siviglia" at the opera house in her home city of Rome. Her childhood and adolescence were filled with music. Silvana Bazzoni, her mother, gave her singing lessons and remained her only teacher even when she started her music studies at the age of 17. There was no "career plan", Cecilia Bartoli remembers, she simply just made music, music and always more music… RAI brought her in front of the television cameras in a talent show; the Paris Opera hired her for a gala concert in 1988 in memory of Maria Callas. Television was there once again, Daniel Barenboim saw her and invited her to work with him, as did Riccardo Muti and Herbert von Karajan.
PO Box 55777, SE-114 83 Stockholm, Sweden. Phone: +468 629 53 00. Fax: +468 662 50 00. [email protected] | www.polarmusicprize.org !
Nikolaus Harnoncourt also wanted to have an artistic collaboration with Cecilia Bartoli during these years. The association with him has remained considerable until today. This is where artistic personalities have converged, who understand how to make contemporary art of the most exciting kind from so-called "old music". Younger director colleagues are following them: Giovanni Antonini, Marc Minkowski and Diego Fasolis became major guiding lights.
Cecilia Bartoli has received the highest state honours – in Italy she is "Cavaliere", in France "Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur" and "Officier des Arts et des Lettres". Famous institutions such as the Royal Academy of Music and the Royal Swedish Music Academy have made her an honorary member; others such as University College Dublin have awarded her an honorary doctorate. In 2010 she was honoured with the Léonie- Sonning Music Prize. Cecilia Bartoli received the Herbert-von-Karajan Prize in Baden- Baden in 2012.
Official website: http://ceciliabartolionline.com/
PO Box 55777, SE-114 83 Stockholm, Sweden. Phone: +468 629 53 00. Fax: +468 662 50 00. [email protected] | www.polarmusicprize.org