Elena Mirtova

Soprano

• Honoured Artist of Russia
• Winner of 1st Prize at the Verdi International Singers Competition (Italy, 1990)
• Winner of 2nd Prize at the Dvorak International Singers Competition (Wroclaw, 1987)
• Winner of 3rd Prize at the Glinka All-Russian Singers Competition (Moscow, 1984)

Yelena Mirtova is a graduate of the Rimsky-Korsakov Leningrad State Conservatoire (class of Professor Novichenko). While still a student she sang in the Music Academy and Philharmonia in Prague, performed the leading role in Iolanthe with success at the Frankfurt Alte-Oper, and also took part in a concert in memory of Herbert von Karajan at the Berlin Philharmonia. Yelena Mirtova has been a soloist at the Mariinsky Theatre since 1989.

The roles she has performed at the Mariinsky Theatre include:
Priestess (Salammbo)
Polovtsian Girl (Prince Igor)
Larina (Eugeny Onegin)
Prilepa (The Queen of Spades)
Iolanthe (Iolanthe)
Olga (The Maid of Pskov)
Volkhova (Sadko)
Domna Saburova (The Tsar's Bride)
The Queen (Kashchei the Immortal)
Zemfira (Aleko – in concert)
Cook (The Nightingale)
Pale Lady (The Gambler),
Natasha Rostova (War and Peace)
Mother (The Nose)
Leonora (Il trovatore)
Violetta (La traviata)
Elisabeth de Valois (Don Carlo)
Priestess and Aida (Aida)
Desdemona (Otello)
Cio-Cio-San (Madama Butterfly)
Margarita (Faust)
Susanna and Rosina (Le nozze di Figaro)
Pamina (Die Zauberflöte)

Yelena Mirtova currently pursues an active concert career, touring with the Mariinsky Theatre in Germany, Italy, Spain, Israel, Japan, Korea, France, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Finland and the USA. She regularly appears as an invited soloist in opera houses and concert halls in Germany, Britain, France, Italy, Spain, Finland, the USA, Japan and Korea, takes part in the international festivals Stars of White Nights and St Petersburg Spring (St Petersburg), the Kuhmo Chamber Music Festival (Finland), the Dreiklang Festival (Germany), and others. During festivals she has frequently given master-classes in solo singing.

In addition, Yelena Mirtova performs as a chamber music singer, appearing with the pianists Natalia Arzumanova, Sofia Vakman, Vladimir Mischouk, Alexey Orlovetsky and Alexander Tchaikovsky, the violinists Mikhail Gantvarg, Ilya Ioff, Ilya Konovalov and Vladimir Ovcharek, and the cellists Dmitry Yeremin, Anatoly Nikitin and Sergey Roldugin. The singer's career biography also includes appearances with outstanding contemporary conductors such as Valery Gergiev, Vladimir Ziva, Mikhail Pletnev, Saulus Sondeckis and Vladislav Chernushenko..

Yelena Mirtova has taken part in recordings of The Queen of Spades and The Gambler (Philips Classics), and in 2004 she recorded a solo disc at the St Petersburg Sound Recording Studio.