Anna Netrebko

Anna Netrebko was born on September 18, 1971 in Krasnodar in the family of a geologist.
According to Anna's father, she started singing in kindergarten. In her school years Netrebko was a soloist of the ensemble "Kuban Pioneer". In addition, she was engaged in sports (she has the title of candidate master of sports in acrobatics and discharges in athletics). In 1988 Netrebko took part in a beauty contest, where she was awarded the title "Vice-Miss Kuban" and won the audience's sympathy prize.

In 1990, Netrebko entered the vocal faculty of the Rimsky-Korsakov Leningrad State Conservatory. During her studies, according to media reports, she worked part-time as a cleaner at the Mariinsky Theater for a while.

In 1993 Netrebko won the All-Russian Glinka Vocal Competition, after which she was invited to join the Mariinsky Theater, where she sang an extensive repertoire. According to her official biography, Netrebko made her debut at the Mariinsky in 1994, while still a fourth-year student, in the opera Le nozze di Figaro. According to some reports, Netrebko never graduated from the conservatory.

In 1995 Netrebko began performing abroad. As a member of the Mariinsky Theatre Company she toured Finland, Germany, France, Israel, Holland, Italy, Japan, Turkey and the USA. She made her Metropolitan Opera debut as Natasha Rostova. Critics noted that this role became one of the best roles in the singer's repertoire: she subsequently performed it at the Mariinsky Theater in St. Petersburg, the Teatro Real in Madrid, La Scala in Milan and the Royal Opera House Covent Garden in London.

Despite her busy touring schedule, the singer remained a soloist with the Mariinsky Theatre. Her Mariinsky repertoire includes such roles as Lyudmila (Ruslan and Lyudmila), Xenia (Boris Godunov), Marfa (The Tsar's Bride), Natasha Rostova (War and Peace), Gerda (The Story of Kai and Gerda), Rosina (The Barber of Seville), Susanna (The Marriage of Figaro) and others.

Netrebko has performed with the world's greatest conductors, among them Valery Gergiev, James Levine, Seiji Ozawa, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Zubin Mehta, Colin Davis and Claudio Abbado. She has repeatedly been invited to give recitals and as a participant in opera productions.

Among Netrebko's recent works, the press has noted her leading roles in Don Pasquale (Metropolitan Opera), Manon (Los Angeles Opera) and The Puritans (Metropolitan Opera).

In July 2006, by decision of the Austrian government, Netrebko was granted citizenship of that country "for special merits".

In May 2007 Netrebko was included in the list of the hundred most influential people in the world published by Time magazine. In November 2007, the music publication Musical America recognized Netrebko as "Musician of the Year". A press release distributed in New York noted that she "is a true superstar of the twenty-first century". The media noted her extraordinary popularity in the West (the press called her "Audrey Hepburn with a voice" for her superb musical and physical appearance).

In February 2008, Anna Netrebko was awarded the title "People's Artist of Russia".
In recent years Netrebko has lived in Vienna, but she has apartments in St. Petersburg and New York.

The press also wrote about the singer's personal life. In early 2008 it became known that Netrebko is expecting a child and soon plans to marry. Her chosen one is the Uruguayan baritone Erwin Schrott, to whom the singer got engaged in New York in 2007.