Akhmed Agadi

If we are speaking about the performers of the lead roles, then the level of drama Akhmed Agadi brought to the opera deserved the loftiest praise. He somehow brought to mind the great performers of this role [Lensky in Eugene Onegin], and, you may well believe, he was not lost among their ranks.
Vremya i denghi (“Time and Money”)

Akhmed Agadi has a voice that has technique, rare beauty and suppleness.
Kommersant (“The Businessman”)

Tenor

• Honoured Artist of Russia (1999)
• People’s Artist of the Republic of Tatarstan (2001)
• Recipient of the Ğabdulla Tuqay State Prize of the Republic of Tatarstan (2008)
• Recipient of Russia’s Golden Mask National Theatre Award (2008)
• Diploma recipient at the XV International Glinka Competition of Vocalists (Smolensk, 1993)

Akhmed Agadi was born in Kazakhstan. Graduated from the Tchaikovsky Moscow State Conservatory in 1993 (class of Yevgeny Kibkalo).

During 1993–2005 he was a soloist with the Moscow State Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Music Theatre, performing the roles of Bayan (Ruslan and Lyudmila), Lensky (Eugene Onegin), Mozart (Mozart and Salieri),the Young Gipsy (Aleko), Don Antonio (Betrothal in a Monastery), Count Almaviva (Rossini’s Il barbiere di Siviglia), Nemorino (L’elisir d’amore), Arlecchino (Pagliacci), Rodolfo (La bohème), Pinkerton (Madama Butterfly), Mario Cavaradossi (Tosca), Alfred (Die Fledermaus) and Faust in Gounod’s eponymous opera.

Has taken part in tours by the theatre’s troupe to Germany (Am Bodensee festival in Friedrichshafen, 1993), South Korea (1997 and 2003) and the USA (2002).

Since 2005 Akhmed Agadi has been a soloist with the Mariinsky Opera Company. The same year he made his Mariinsky Theatre debut, appearing as Rodolfo in La bohème.

Repertoire at the Mariinsky Theatre:
Count Vaudémont (Iolanta, concert performance)
Sir Edgar Ravenswood (Lucia di Lammermoor)
The Duke of Mantua (Rigoletto)
Alfredo Germont (La traviata)
Manrico (Il trovatore)
Gabriele Adorno (Simon Boccanegra)
Don Alvaro (La forza del destino)
Don Carlo (Don Carlo)
Radamès (Aida)
Enzo Grimaldo (La Gioconda, concert performance)
Otello (Verdi’s Otello)
Turiddu (Cavalleria rusticana)
Canio (Pagliacci)
Chevalier des Grieux (Puccini’s Manon Lescaut)
Rodolfo (La bohème)
Andrea Chénier (Andrea Chénier, concert performance)
Mario Cavaradossi (Tosca)
Maurice de Saxe (Adriana Lecouvreur)
Vassili (Siberia, concert performance)
Pinkerton (Madama Butterfly)
Dick Johnson (La fanciulla del West)
The Unknown Prince (Calaf) (Turandot)
Don José (Carmen)
Paco (La vida breve, concert performance)
Tenor role in Verdi’s Requiem

The singer’s repertoire also includes Don Ottavio (Don Giovanni), Ivan the Terrible (Rezeda Akhiyarova’s Soyumbike), Ğabdulla Tuqay (Rezeda Akhiyarova’s The Love of the Poet), Birzhan (Mukan Tulebayev’s Birzhan and Sara), the title part in Nazib Zhiganov’s opera Jalil, the tenor roles in Beethoven’s Missa solemnis, Mahler’s Eighth Symphony and Das Lied von der Erde and Rachmaninoff’s The Bells.

Akhmed Agadi has performed at many prestigious venues. He has sung in France, Great Britain, the Netherlands, Denmark, Austria, Belgium, Hungary, Latvia, Argentina, Turkey, Egypt, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan. Has appeared in productions by the Bolshoi Theatre of Russia, Amsterdam’s Dutch National Opera, Copenhagen’s Royal Danish Opera, Budapest’s Hungarian State Opera, the Opéra de Strasbourg, Buenos Aires’ Teatro Colón and Kazan’s State Opera of Tatarstan among others, and has performed in London’s Royal Albert Hall. Has taken part in festivals in Baden-Baden (Pinkerton (Madama Butterfly) and Rodolfo (La bohème) under Valery Gergiev), Chişinău, Nizhny Novgorod and Saratov. Akhmed Agadi regularly appears at Kazan’s Fyodor Chaliapin International Opera Festival, where he was named the best singer in 1998.