Adela Zaharia

Hailed as a “true revelation” by Euro News, Romanian soprano Adela Zaharia is the 2017 first place winner of Operalia competition. In the 2018-2019 season, Ms. Zaharia sang Violetta in La traviata conducted by James Conlon at Los Angeles Opera. She made her role debuts as both Violetta and the title role of Donizetti’s Maria Stuarda at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein, where she also sang Konstanze in Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Gilda in Rigoletto, and Donna Anna in Don Giovanni. Concert highlights are her BBC Proms debut singing the world premiere of Iain Bell’s Aurora with the Liverpool Philharmonic, a Mozart gala concert with Placido Domingo in Prague, tours to Moscow and Barcelona as a soloist with the Deutsche Oper am Rhein and Beethoven 9th Symphony with European Union Orchestra in Bucharest.

The prior season saw Ms. Zaharia sing the title role of Lucia di Lammermoor at the Bayerische Staatsoper, where she also starred as Angelica in a new production of Haydn’s Orlando Paladino. She also made her North American opera debut as Gilda in Rigoletto at Los Angeles Opera and returned to the Deutsche Oper am Rhein where her roles included Lucia di Lammermoor, Konstanze in Die Entführung aus dem Serail, and Gilda in Rigoletto. She also sang Pamina with the Komische Oper on tour in Japan. Concert appearances included her debut at the George Enescu Festival, where she sang the mad scene from Iain Bell’s A Harlot’s Progress, a gala concert with Placido Domingo in Guadalajara with the Philharmonic Orchestra of Jalisco and the charity event AIDS Gala in Deutsche Oper am Rhein. As a former member of the Komische Oper Berlin opera studio, she also sang Micaëla, Helena in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Elsbeth in Offenbach’s Fantasio, and Pamina in Barrie Kosky’s production of Die Zauberflöte. She has also appeared in Kosky’s production for her debuts at the Gran Teatre del Liceu, the Bolshoi Theater, the Edinburgh International Festival, and the Shanghai Grand Theater. While studying voice and piano at the Gheorghe Dima Music Academy in her Romania, Ms. Zaharia sang such roles as Gilda, Norina, and Musetta. Her concert repertoire includes Carmina Burana, Handel’s Messiah, Bach’s Matthäuspassion, Brahms’s Ein deutches Requiem, Mozart’s Requiem, and Schumann’s Das Paradies und die Peri.