Ildar Abdrazakov

Biography

Born in Ufa (Bashkiria). On graduating from the Ufa State Institute of Arts, he joined the Bashkirian Opera and Ballet Theatre.

The title role in Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro was the vehicle for Abdrazakov’s 1998 house debut at St. Petersburg’s Mariinsky Theatre. Among his other signature roles are both the title character and Leporello in Mozart’s Don Giovanni; Méphistophélès in Gounod’s Faust and Berlioz’s Le Damnation de Faust; Oroveso in Bellini’s Norma; Selim in Rossini’s Turk in Italy, and Assur in his Semiramide. As well as for his Attila, the russian bass is noted for other Verdi roles: Banquo in Macbeth, Walter in Luisa Miller, and the title character in Oberto, Giovanni da Procida in I vespri siciliani, Philip II in Don Carlo.

In the late 1990s, he won a string of prestigious vocal competitions: the Moscow Grand Prix named after Irina Arkhipova, the Glinka International Vocal Competition, the Rimsky-Korsakov International Competition, and the International Obrazova competition. His 2000 win at the Maria Callas International Television Competition in Parma thrust him into the international spotlight and led to his debut at Teatro alla Scala as Rodolfo (La sonnambula) in 2001, and the following year he performed the part of Banquo Verdi’s Macbeth. Since then he's a frequent guest at La Scala, where he joined Riccardo Muti in concert for the reopening of the theatre in 2004-05 and sang Moses in a production of Rossini’s Moïse et Pharaon (that was recorded and released on CD and DVD). In the 18-19 season, he starred as Verdi’s Attila in a season opening new production televised globally. He has also sung three solo recitals and Don Ruy da Silva in Verdi’s Ernani at the famous house.

Since making his Metropolitan Opera debut in 2004 in Don Giovanni under James Levine, Abdrazakov has appeared there regularly. He headlined the gala opening of the company’s 2015-16 season in the title role in a new Sir Richard Eyre production of Le nozze di Figaro. Previously, he sang the title role in a new Dmitri Tcherniakov’s staging of Borodin’s Prince Igor (a performance captured on DVD and Blu-ray by Deutsche Grammophon). Other notable Met productions include his role debut as Henry VIII opposite Anna Netrebko in Anna Bolena, Dosifey in Mussorgsky’s Khovanshchina, Escamillo in two productions of Carmen, the title role of Attila under the baton of Riccardo Muti, the title role in Le Nozze di Figaro, Assur in Rossini’s Semiramide, Leoporello Don Giovanni and most recently Banquo in in Verdi’s Macbeth and Méphistophélès in Berlioz’s La Damnation de Faust.

His first appearance at London’s Royal Opera House in 2009 was made with Verdi’s Requiem in concert with Sir Antonio Pappano; and he has since returned there to sing Don Basilio in Rossini’s ll barbiere di Siviglia and Filippo II in Verdi’s Don Carlo.

The bass made his Salzburg Festival debut in 2009 in a new production of Rossini’s Moïse et Pharaon. Since then, he has returned regularly, singing amongst others Méphistophélès in a new production of Faust, Mustafa alongside Cecilia Bartoli in the Festival’s new production of Rossini’s Italiana in Algeri and performances of Verdi’s Messa da Requiem conducted by Riccardo Muti.

Abdrazakov begins the 2012/13 season portraying two of Mozart’s most iconic title characters. First, in September, he appears as the infamous anti-hero in Don Giovanni at the Washington National Opera, and then in October and November, he sings the title role in both Le nozze di Figaro and Don Giovanni at the Metropolitan Opera. Other opera engagements include ll barbiere di Siviglia in Munich, Don Giovanni with the Vienna State Opera, and King Philip II in Don Carlo at the Torino Opera on the concert stage, Abdrazakov sings in Prokofiev’s cantata Ivan the Terrible with the Deutsche Symphony Orchestra in Berlin and is a special guest performer at Dmitri Hvorostovsky’s 50th birthday gala in St. Petersburg.

In 2016 he debuted at the Bolshoi Theatre as Philipp II in Don Carlo, in 2020 performed the role of Don Basilio (Il barbiere di Siviglia). In 2021 he took part in the premiere performances of Don Giovanni singing the title role (conductor Tugan Sokhiev, director Semyon Spivak).

In 2017 he made his first appearance at Netherlands Opera in Amsterdam performing the title role in Tcherniakov’s production of Prince Igor.

Among his recent engagements: Don Carlo (Philipp II), Boris Godunov and Prince Igor (title parts) at the Paris National Opera, Macbeth (Banquo) and Le Damnation de Faust (Méphistophélès) at the Met, and others.

In 2018-19, Ildar Abdrazakov made his debut as a stage director in a production of Attila for Bashkir State Opera in which he also performed the title role.

Abdrazakov has appeared with virtually every major opera company in the United States and Europe. In addition to those already mentioned, he has sung on the stages of Barcelona’s Teatre Liceu, Madrid’s Teatro Real, Paris’s Opera Bastille, the San Francisco Opera, the Washington National Opera, and the Los Angeles Opera. On the concert stage, he has given recitals in Russia, Italy, Japan, and the United States, and performed with orchestras including the Chicago Symphony, the Vienna Philharmonic, the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, the Bayerische Rundfunk, the Rotterdam Philharmonic, the Orchestre National de France, the Orchestra Filarmonica della Scala, and Rome’s Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia. Among the noted conductors with whom he has collaborated are Riccardo Muti, Valery Gergiev, James Levine, Gianandrea Noseda, Bernard de Billy, Riccardo Frizza, Riccardo Chailly, and Antonio Pappano.

In addition to his Grammy Award-winning recording of Verdi’s Requiem with Muti and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Abdrazakov has recorded unpublished arias by Rossini with Chailly and the Symphony Orchestra of Milan Giuseppe Verdi for Decca and Cherubini’s Mass with Muti and the Bayerische Rundfunk for EMI Classics. For Chandos, he has recorded Shostakovich’s Suite on Verses of Michelangelo and Rachmaninoff’s The Miserly Knight, both with Noseda and the BBC Philharmonic. In early 2017 Abdrazakov signed an exclusive contract with Deutsche Grammophon. His first solo album Verdi was released in summer 2019. The bass’s DVD releases include Moïse et Pharaon from La Scala, Oberto from Bilbao, Norma from Parma and Lucia di Lammermoor from the Metropolitan Opera. Marking the Verdi bicentennial, May 2013 saw Abdrazakov’s star turn in the title role of Attila immortalized on the Mariinsky label’s first DVD/Blu-ray release.