Maria Markina

Houston Grand Opera Studio alumna Maria Markina sings Pauline and Daphnis in The Queen of Spades this spring. She appeared last season at HGO as Maddalena in Verdi’s Rigoletto and Lola in Mascagni’s Cavalleria rusticana. The mezzo-soprano is a member of the ensemble at Hamburg State Opera in Germany, where she appears frequently in leading roles. The Moscow native won first prize in the 2006 Eleanor McCollum Competition for Young Singers. Other HGO roles have included Hansel in performances of Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel, The Second Lady in The Magic Flute and Lápak / Woodpecker in Janácek’s The Cunning Little Vixen. A former member of Moscow’s Novaya Opera Theatre, she appeared there in a wide variety of roles including Olga in Eugene Onegin, the Third Lady in Mozart’s The Magic Flute, and Lel in Rimsky-Korsakov’s Snow Maiden. She has also sung Bradamante in Handel’s Alcina at Wolf Trap Opera and the title role of Rossini’s La Cenerentola at Connecticut Opera. She was a featured soloist in the Houston Ballet production of Stravinsky’s Les noces and in Da Camera’s production of Brahms’s Die Liebeslieder Walzer.