Aigul Akhmetshina & Antonio Pappano
Biography Aigul Akhmetshina & Antonio Pappano
Aigul Akhmetshina
A Decca Classics recording artist, British-Russian mezzo-soprano Aigul Akhmetshina begins her 2026-27 season with a role debut as Donna Elvira Don Giovanni at the Royal Ballet and Opera, followed by returns as Angelina La Cenerentola at Teatro di San Carlo, Dalila Samson et Dalila at The Metropolitan Opera, Charlotte Werther at Opéra national de Paris and Bayerische Staatsoper, Adalgisa Norma at Teatro Real Madrid, Lyubasha The Tsar’s bride at Staatsoper Berlin, and Carmen at Bayerische Staatsoper.
On the concert stage, she makes her role debut as Giovanna Seymour Anna Bolena at Tiroler Festspiele Erl, performs the mezzo-soprano solo in Verdi’s Messa da Requiem at Gran Teatre del Liceu, gives a recital at the Polish National Opera, and appears at The Metropolitan Opera Diamond Anniversary Gala.
Recent seasons have seen her make role debuts as Dalila Samson et Dalila at both the Royal Ballet and Opera and Staatsoper Berlin, and as Fenena in a new production of Nabucco at Arena di Verona.
In concert, she has presented recital programmes at Den Norske Opera & Ballett in Oslo, Teatro Colón Buenos Aires and Teatro di San Carlo in Naples, performed gala concerts at the Hungarian State Opera and with Piotr Beczała at the Baden-Baden Festspielhaus. Further she has appeared with the Oslo Philharmonic in Ravel’s Shéhérazade and at the Musikverein Wien in Elgar’s Sea Pictures and Chausson’s Poème de l’amour et de la mer.
Since her breakout debut as Carmen at the Royal Ballet and Opera at the age of 21, Ms. Akhmetshina has rapidly ascended the international operatic stage. She has appeared at major opera houses including The Metropolitan Opera, the Royal Ballet and Opera, Wiener Staatsoper, Bayerische Staatsoper, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Teatro Real Madrid, Opéra national de Paris, and Arena di Verona.
Awards and Recognition include: CD of the Year – OPER! Awards 2025 for her debut album Aigul (Decca Classics), Female Singer of the Year – International Opera Awards (2023), Sky Arts Award – Classical Music (2024), Olivier Award Nominee – Outstanding Achievement in Opera (2024), First Prize – International Hans Gabor Belvedere Singing Competition (2017).
Sir Antonio Pappano
One of today’s most sought-after conductors, Sir Antonio Pappano is renowned for his charismatic leadership and inspiring performances across both symphonic and operatic repertoires. He is Chief Conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra, and Conductor Laureate of the Royal Opera and Ballet Covent Garden and Music Director Emeritus of the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, having held the position of Music Director at both institutions from 2002-2024 and 2005-2023 respectively. Nurtured as a pianist, repetiteur and assistant conductor at many of the most important opera houses of Europe and North America, including at the Lyric Opera of Chicago and several seasons at the Bayreuth Festival as musical assistant to Daniel Barenboim, Pappano was appointed Music Director of Oslo’s Den Norske Opera in 1990, and from 1992-2002 served as Music Director of the Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie in Brussels. From 1997-1999 he was Principal Guest Conductor of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra.
Pappano is in demand as an opera conductor at the highest international level, including with the Metropolitan Opera New York, the State Operas of Vienna and Berlin, the Bayreuth and Salzburg Festivals, Lyric Opera of Chicago and the Teatro alla Scala, and has appeared as a guest conductor with many of the world’s most prestigious orchestras, including the Berlin and Vienna Philharmonic Orchestras, the Staatskapelle Dresden, the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, the Bavarian Radio, the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, the Orchestre de Paris and the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, as well as the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, Chicago and Boston Symphonies, the Philadelphia and Cleveland Orchestras. He maintains a particularly strong relationship with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe.
Highlights of the 2025/26 season and beyond include return visits to the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, the Czech Philharmonic, and guest appearances with the Swedish Radio Symphony and the Orchestra f the Royal Danish Opera, and he continues the acclaimed new Ring Cycle at the Royal Opera with a new production of Siegfried. In his second season as Chief Conductor of the London Symphony, Pappano takes the orchestra on wide-ranging tours to major European capitals and festivals, and a residency in Hanoi, Vietnam, as well as concerts at London’s Barbican Centre with concertante performances of Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde, and symphonic repertoire from Bernstein, Britten and Copland, to Macmillan, Musgrave, Mahler, and further recordings of Vaughan Williams and Elgar for LSO Live.
