Mariangela Sicilia – soprano

Promising Italian soprano, she won the Tito Schipa lyric contest in Lecce, making her debut as Adina in L’Elisir d’Amore. She recently performed Musetta in La Bohème in Lucca, Pisa and Ravenna, Arsenia in Jommelli’s Don Trastullo at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples; Il Viaggio a Reims at the Rossini Opera Festival; Cléopatre at the Withsun Festival in Salzburg; Il Viaggio a Reims at the Opera Studio at the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro; and L'Arlesiana at the Wexford Festival Opera.

Future plans include L'Elisir d'Amore at the Glyndebourne Touring Opera, in Monte Carlo and Madrid; Cristina, Regina di Svezia (title role) at the Wexford Festival Opera; L'Arlesiana at the Festival Pergolesi Spontini in Jesi; active also on the concert side, Mariangela Sicilia will perform a concert in honor of Giuseppe Verdi in Lugo.

Adriana Di Paola- Mezzo

Winner of Santa Chiara Contest in Naples, she debuted at the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro and at the Festival Dei Due Mondi in Spoleto, after that she was invited in Valencia where at the Palau de Les Arts Reina Sofia is starred in Le nozze di Figaro and Ariadne auf Naxos, Andrew Davis conducting. She sang also Ninetta in I Vespri Siciliani at the Festival Verdi (2010) in Parma, where she also starred as Curra in La Forza del Destino under the baton of Gianluigi Gelmetti. On the concert side she performed Die Schöpfung by Haydn at the Teatro Filarmonico in Verona, conducted by Lothar Zagrosek; Der Kronungsmesse with Omer Meir Wellber again in Valencia; Brahms’ Alto Raphsody and the Debussy’s Demoiselle élue in Cagliari; La Petite Messe Solennelle in Rome; Rossini’s Stabat Mater in San Sebastian. Last summer she took part at the Young Project Artists at the Salzburg Festival, where she sang in Der Zauberfloete, Carmen and Giulio Cesare and where she gained great success singing the closing recital of the Project. Mrs Di Paola recently starred in Gianni Schicchi with the Accademia Santa Cecilia in Rome and Rigoletto in Valencia. Plans include: Ariadne auf Naxos at the Glyndebourne Festival Opera; Zubin Mehta conducting; Giulio Cesare (Cornelia) in Klagenfurt; Anna Bolena in the first revival in the modern times of the Alto edition.

Paolo Olmi - Conductor

Paolo Olmi studied under Massimo Pradella and Franco Ferrara in Rome. Since making his operatic debut in 1986 at the Teatro Comunale in Bologna he has conducted in many of the major concert halls and opera throughout the world including Europe, North and South America, Australia and Asia. His huge repertoire includes all the Verdi's operas and masterpieces by Rossini, Puccini, Ponchielli, Giordano, Donizetti, Bellini, Mozart, Cilea, Gounod, Kurt Weil. He teaches at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London. Highlights of his recent performances are: La Gioconda at the Deutsche Oper Berlin; Falstaff, Verdi's Jerusalem, Adriana Lecouvreur, Guillaume Tell and a concert offered by the Television to the Queen of Holland recorded by EMI Classic at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam; L'Elisir d'Amore, Un Ballo in Maschera and L'Italiana in Algeri at the Opéra de Bordeaux; Aida and Lucia di Lammermoor at the Savonlinna Opera Festival; Madama Butterfly in Cesena; L'Italiana in Algeri in Nancy and Bologna; Cavalleria Rusticana and Zanetto in Lecce; Don Pasquale in Toulouse. M° Olmi will conduct La Traviata at the Savonlinna Opera Festival.