B i o g r a p h y
Gifted with an astonishing vocal extension and a temperament of strong emotional impact Silvia Dalla Benetta has truly become one of the most renowned sopranos of the great Italian tradition in the dramatic coloratura repertoire. The Vincenza-born soprano, thanks to her amazing technique and her natural ability to tie notes, carries us from Händel to Rossini, from hard Belcanto to young Verdi, to Alfano and the lirical Puccini. Today Silvia Dalla Benetta is truly considered by both the critique and the public one of the best interpreters of Rossini’s dramatic roles, beyond Verdi's Lady Macbeth, with which she won the Premio Abbiati and she will perform again in 2023 in Trieste.
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In 2022 to celebrate her thirty years in career, Silvia Dalla Benetta sings for the first time Cleopatra in Händel's Julius Caesar in Pisa and she performs once more in Verdi’s Macbeth in Nice and Antibes.
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In 2021 Silvia was Abigaille in Nabucco in Oviedo; in 2020 she performed in Messa da Requiem in Monte-Carlo, in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony in Piacenza, and was Lady Macbeth for the French version of Verdi’s Macbeth at the Verdi Festival in Parma which received the prestigious Abbiatti critique Prize.
In 2019 she sang in Semiramide in Bilbao, in Messa da Requiem in Taranto and Matera, at the Rossini Festival in Bad Wilbad for a concert dedicated in some of Rossini’s non published work, then in Vesprae Solennes de Confessore (Solemn Vespers for a Confessor) in Catania, and for the first time in Lady Macbeth in Pavia, Como, Brescia and Cremona.
In 2018 she sang Micaëla in Carmen in Liège, in Petite Messe Solennelle, Sinaïde in Moïse and in Zelmira at the Rossini Festival in Bad Wildbad; she appeared at the Concert d'été (Summer Concert) in Liège, and also sang Gulnara in Il corsaro in Modena and Amaltea in Mosè in Egitto in Pisa and in Novara.
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In 2017 Slivia Dalla Benetta appeared at the Concerto Finale for the Al Bustan Festival in Beirut with arias from Nabucco and Aida. She sang in Norma in Ferrara and Fiordiligi in Così fan tutte in Mexico City. She also appeared in Mozart’s Messa in do minore, Zenobia in Aureliano in Palmira and in Cristina in Eduardo e Cristina at the Rossini Festival in Bad Wildbad, in Hélène in Jérusalem at the Verdi Festival in Parma, and again in Norma in Charleroi and in Hanna Glawari in La vedova allegra in Catania.
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The Italian soprano started her 2015/2016 season with Elisabetta in Elisabetta, Regina d’Inghilterra in Sassari. Then she sang Gulnara in Il corsaro at the prestigious Festival Verdi Parma, Marguerite in Les Huguenots at the Nice Opera House, Norma in Lucerne, Bianca in Bianca e Gernando at the Rossini in Wildbad Festival, Aida in Malta, Sakuntala in Alfano’s La leggenda di Sakuntala in Catania and Opera Gala Concerts in Hungary with MAV symphony orchestra.
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In the 2014/2015 season the Italian soprano excelled in her role debut as Abigaille in Nabucco in Gozo, Malta, having previously debuted as Elvira in Ernani at the Lithuanian National Opera of Vilnius; Semiramide in Nice, Donna Anna in Don Giovanni in Pisa, Fiorilla in Il Turco in Italia in Catania, Sophia/Heronyma in the world premiere of Hatzinasios’s El Greco in Athens, Eleonora in Lindpaintner’s Il vespro siciliano and Isabella in L’inganno felice at the Rossini in Wildbad Festival.
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The 2013/2014 season was marked by her interpretations of two Verdian roles, Messa da Requiem in Jesi and Alice in Falstaff in Sassari and Jesi, as well as by performances of Bellini’s Norma in Zagreb and Micaëla in Carmen at the Teatro Carlo Felice of Genoa and gala concerts in Vicenza’s Teatro Olimpico and the Teatro Alfieri of Asti.
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Silvia Dalla Benetta’s extensive repertoire includes roles such as Gulnara in Il corsaro (Parma Verdi Festival, ABAO Bilbao and Modena), Giselda in I lombardi alla prima crociata (Teatro Regio di Parma), Cio-Cio San in Madama Butterfly (in tour with the Teatro Verdi of Trieste), Mimì in La Bohème (Palma de Mallorca and the Hong Kong Performing Arts Center), Liù in Turandot (Teatro Verdi of Pisa), Hanna Glawari in The Merry Widow (Trieste’s Teatro Verdi, Genoa’s Teatro Carlo Felice, the Fondazione Arena di Verona and Catania's Teatro Massimo Bellini), Micaëla in Carmen (Arena di Verona, Teatro Massimo di Palermo, the aforementioned production of the Carlo Felice and Opéra Royal de Wallonie-Liège), Marguerite in Gounod’s Faust (Teatro Coccia di Novara), Juliette in Roméo et Juliette (Trieste), and the four women of Les contes d’Hoffmann (Circuito Lirico Lombardo).
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Silvia Dalla Benetta’s brilliant interpretation of Violetta Valéry in Verdi’s La traviata has been a point of reference in excellence by both the critique and a very enthusiatic public ; performances for which she’s received personal ovation in premiere theaters such as Turin’s Teatro Regio, the Maggio Musicale of Florence, the Arena di Verona, the Teatro Carlo Felice, Toronto’s Mississauga Opera, the Puccini Festival of Torre del Lago (with transmission in cinemas throughout Italy), and the Mohammed V National Theater of Rabat.
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Belcanto repertoire has likewise played a significant role in Dalla Benetta’s wide-ranging career, with successes as Norma (Pisa, Cremona, Pavia, Como, Brescia, Trento, Zagreb, Luzern, Ferrara and Charleroi), the title role in Lucia di Lammermoor (Cagliari, Trieste, Fermo, Wiesbaden, Bern, Mississauga, St. Gallen, Livorno, Pisa, Lucca, and Ravenna), Rossini’s Semiramide (Livorno, Rovigo, Trento, Pisa, Festival Les Musicales du Luberon, Nice and Bilbao), and Fiorilla in Il turco in Italia (Vicenza, Hamburg, Pisa, Trieste, Catania).
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Silvia Dalla Benetta has collaborated with conductors Roberto Abbado, Andrea Battistoni, Giampaolo Bisanti, Daniele Callegari, Antonino Fogliani, Gianluigi Gelmetti, Nicola Luisotti, Carlo Montanaro, Piergiorgio Morandi, Daniel Oren, Renato Palumbo, Donato Renzetti, José Miguel Perez-Sierra, Jonathan Webb among others, as well as stage directors Franco Zeffirelli, Jonathan Miller, Daniele Abbado, Laurent Pelly, Hugo De Ana and Henning Brockhaus.
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The Vicenza-born soprano studied at the Conservatorio “Benedetto Marcello” of Venice and counts among her teachers Romano Gandolfi, Aldo Ceccato, Stella Silva, Mirella Parutto, Alida Ferrarini, Ida Adami Corradetti, Luciana Serra, Denia Mazzola, Sherman Lowe, and Renata Scotto. She was the 2004 winner of the Sanremo Opera Competition.