Biography

Elena Pankratova is making her U.S. debut. Her upcoming engagements throughout the 2023-24 season include Die Färberin in Die Frau ohne Schatten at the Vienna State Opera, the title role in Turandot, both in Barcelona and at the Metropolitan Opera, as well as Elektra in Elektra at the Munich Opera Festival. Her international breakthrough came in 2010 in the role of Färberin at the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino—one she revisited at La Scala in Milan (2012), as well as the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires (2013). Since then, she has performed in houses across Europe. No stranger to the works of Wagner, Pankratova became the first Russian high dramatic soprano in the 140-year history of the Bayreuth Festival to make her debut as Kundry in Parsifal in 2016, a role she would go on to reprise for the next three seasons. For her interpretations of both Kundry and Färberin the soprano received the Russian “Casta Diva” opera prize for singer of the year in 2018. Operatic appearances in recent years include Ortrud (Lohengrin) at the 2022 Salzburg Easter Festival and Vienna State Opera, Kundry at Wagner Days 2022 in Leipzig, Turandot in Philipp Stölzl’s new production at the Berlin State Opera, and her role debut as Isolde (Tristan und Isolde) at the Bavarian State Opera. In 2021, she was member of the jury at the prestigious International Tenor Viñas Singing Competition in Barcelona. Since 2015, Pankratova has combined her stage career with a singing professorship at the University of Music and Performing Arts Graz in Austria.