Irina Lungu: ‘I grew up with Violetta Valéry, I dream of Adriana Lecouvreur’

The first Violetta was in 2007 in Rome. “It’s been 15 years, over 200 performances, I grew up with her” says Irina Lungu, Russian opera star, one of the most appreciated soprano on the international scene, who tomorrow evening will return to play the role of Verdi’s heroine in Verona, on the podium Francesco Ivan Ciampa and Francesco Meli as Alfredo, in a new production in collaboration with the Uffizi Gallery. “Violetta has accompanied me throughout my career – explains Lungu to Adnkronos – she has always been a constant, for me she is a very important character and I am very happy to be able to play her even today, to be vocally always suitable for this role, of do not lose the nuances. ”Violetta, like Irina,“ is very sincere, she is a character with whom I am very in tune – remarks the soprano -. I would like to be able to tell this extraordinary story to the public, to convey its soul. In the third act I really give myself, dying on stage I live it as a personal catharsis. “In the last season Irina never stopped: after her debut as Elvira in ‘I Puritani’, she was Juliette in ‘Roméo et Juliette’ at the Wiener Staatsoper, Gilda in ‘Rigoletto’ at the Staatsoper Unter den Linden in Berlin and the protagonist of Lucia di Lammermoor at the New National Theater in Tokyo. and then, since I feel very Mozartian, I would like to play the countess in ‘The Marriage of Figaro’ – she explains – it is a very refined role, in which I would see myself a lot. a character to which I aspire so much. “At the moment he intends to continue with the roles of coloratura,” they help me to work on the technique, on the phrasing, on the voice, on the artistic approach to singing “admits the soprano, who does not hide that he wants to do” some steps forward “profession ale. In the past, he remembers, “I rehearsed with lyrical characters like Marguerite in ‘Faust’ and Mimì from ‘La Bohème’, now I will try to move along this line. I have planned a debut in ‘Simon Boccanegra’ in a couple of years and piano will try something more lyrical than Verdi. I’m cautious, I want to see where my voice will take me. “It was bel canto, she confesses, that chose it, and not the other way around, when she was 6 years old:” I started studying piano and I sing – he underlines – then I met a singing teacher in Russia (baritone Mikhail Podkopaev, ed) with whom I lived a total, intellectual symbiosis for 5 years. I graduated and came to Italy with a scholarship I study at the Accademia della Scala “. The first time at the Arena, on the other hand, dates back to 2009 with the Micaëla of ‘Carmen’, an ever-vivid memory that moves her a lot.” When I went on stage in the third act it was after midnight and I remember this gigantic moon, the silence around and I had the chills – he remarks -. The scenography was not even needed. While in other cases I have to stimulate myself to give my best, in the Arena I have to take a few steps back otherwise the emotions risk being too many ”. (by Federica Mochi)