Sonia Prina

Studied singing and trumpet at the Conservatorio Giuseppe Verdi in Milan. Then in 1994 she enhanced her skills at the programme for young vocalists at Teatro alla Scala. She has performed at the most renowned opera houses, including those in Milan, Paris, London, Vienna, Munich, Madrid, Sydney, San Francisco and Chicago, as well as at the best festivals in Salzburg, Beaune, Aix-en-Provence and Krakow. She has worked on a regular basis with Giovanni Antonini, Rinaldo Alessandrini, Fabio Biondi, Antonio Florio, Ottavio Dantone, Emmanuelle Haïm, William Christie, Ivor Bolton, Alessandro de Marchi, Alan Curtis, Adam Fischer and Jordi Savall, to name but a few. Prina is currently the most highly valued contralto in Europe. Her repertoire includes numerous oratorio parts and important opera roles including, among others, works by Handel (Rinaldo, Orlando, Alcina, Tamerlano, Amadigi, Giulio Cesare, Ariodante) Monteverdi (Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria, L’Incoronazione di Poppea, L’Orfeo), Vivaldi (Farnace), Vinci (Partenope) and Alessandro Scarlatti (La Principessa Fedele, La Vergine dei Dolori), as well as Mozart (Ascanio in Alba) Rossini (The Barber of Seville, The Italian Girl in Algiers, La Pietra di Paragone) and Donizetti (Anna Bolena). She has given recitals with some of the leading ensembles specialising in performing early music (including Il Giardino Armonico, Ensemble Matheus and Accademia Bizantina) around Europe, South America and Japan. She has recorded for Naïve (Vivaldi’s La Senna festeggiante and L’Olimpiade with Rinaldo Alessandrini and Arie Ritrovate with Ottavio Dantone), Virgin Classics (Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo and Handel’s Il Trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno with Emmanuelle Haïm), Alia Vox (Vivaldi’s Fernace with Jordi Savall) and Archiv Produktion (Handel’s Rodelinda with Alan Curtis), among others. During the season 2009/2010 she will perform in Frankfurt (Vivaldi’s Orlando furioso), Glyndebourne (Handel’s Rinaldo), Paris and Lille (Handel’s Orlando), Houston and Chicago (Handel’s Serse), Barcelona (Donizetti’s Anna Bolena) and in Krakow during the Misteria Paschalia Festival and the Opera Rara series (Handel’s Rinaldo with Ottavio Dantone and La Resurrezione and Vivaldi’s Ottone in Villa with Giovanni Antonini).