Mezzo-soprano Lena Belkina is member of the Oper Leipzig as of the season 2009/10 and was already engaged for the upcoming season. She can be heard in Mozart’s Zauberflöte, Rossini’s Turco in Italia and Puccini’s Manon Lescaut as well as in concerts and recitals there. Further roles of her repertoire are Carmen/ Mercedes, Haensel und Gretel/Haensel and Eugene Onegin/Olga.

On the occasion of the Salzburg Festival 2010 she will study the role of Orfeo in Christoph Willibald Gluck’s opera Orfeo ed Euridice under the baton of Riccardo Muti. She also will take part in the Young Singers Project led by Mozart-tenor Michael Schade.

In summer 2009 Lena Belkina studied with Prof. Marga Schiml at the Musik Hochschule Karlsruhe where she was introduced to famous mezzo-soprano Brigitte Fassbaender during a master-class. Mrs. Fassbaender appraised Lena Belkina with the words “thus much talent and quality is needed for a carreer”. Also Eva Wagner Pasquier, General Manager of the Bayreuth Festival, heard of this promising talent and asked Lena Belkina to audition for her in the Bayreuth Festival Hall in summer 2009.

Lena Belkina was born in Tashkent. Her preference for music and singing already arose in her infancy. In 2003 Lena Belkina finished the music-highschool with distinction and later was accepted at the National R.M.Glier-Music-Academy in Kiev, where she studied until 2006.

As of 2006 Lena Belkina continued her studies at the National Tchaikovsky-Music-Conservatory in Kiev, where she took part in several productions of the opera-studio. She was student of famous coloratura-soprano Prof. Eugenia Miroschnitschenko.

During her studies Lena Belkina took part in many national and international competitions and won an international competition for juveniles. At the International Borys Romanovich Hmyria Competition Kiev in 2008she enthused both jury and audience and was awarded the first prize.

2009