Reviews

It is inevitable that Gilda should see the supposed student Gualtier Maldé as her liberator from her confining circumstances: his name alone is enough to inspire undying love. Anastasiya Taratorkina sang this aria (“Caro nome che il mio cor”) with genuine feeling, taking it far beyond a mere virtuoso showpiece. Bell-like high notes, brilliant coloratura, convincingly precise phrasing and the purest tone, coupled with profound emotional depth, made this aria a masterpiece of vocal expression.

Not only was she perfectly up to the lyrical and virtuosic demands of this role, but she also portrays the character in a rare, multi-layered and nuanced way as a young woman who certainly has a mind of her own.

Anastasiya Taratorkina was the perfect Gilda; she didn’t need the frilly pink dress that Mrs Ivschina had dressed her in to appeal to a child’s imagination, for she won the audience over with her magnificent performance – which was all the more impressive given the cramped space, which was also crammed full of soft toys, leaving little room to move. And then there was her voice! Silvery, bright, perfectly pitched high notes – she had it all and delivered it effortlessly.

The fact that Gilda longs to break free from this prison is embodied by the magnificent Anastasiya Taratorkina in a way that is deeply moving. […] One senses that behind the idealised façade lies a woman with desires of her own. In the death scene, she then achieves a wonderfully ethereal, almost otherworldly tone. It is deeply moving.

With her brilliantly crafted coloratura, Anastasiya Taratorkina sings her way from a doll-like state into a newfound femininity, emerging as a great vocal seductress. She delivers a sensational performance in this, Verdi’s late swan song to bel canto.

But it is Taratorkina who steals the show. The way she phrases, hits the high notes effortlessly, shines in the forte – and, in the most delicate sotto voce, is a sweet, delicate thread of a voice that captivates the entire audience: it’s something you have to experience for yourself. In the end, it all gets under your skin: the storm, sung by the chorus, just as much as Gilda’s death. This is how Verdi should move you. This is opera.

In the subsequent performances, Anastasiya Taratorkina gives a compelling performance as a lively, alert Constance, with a well-controlled soprano voice and a natural stage presence.

Anastasiya Taratorkina brought great zest for life and freshness to her portrayal of Soeur Constance, singing with a pleasant and exemplary command of her craft.

…as well as Anastasiya Taratorkina (Sister Constance). The latter provided the vocal highlights of the evening with her sensationally flexible lyrical coloratura soprano.

Anastasiya Taratorkina was an excellent Alphise with her youthful, bright soprano voice.

He is answered here by soprano Anastasiya Taratorkina, who, thanks to her natural expressiveness and flexible authority, stands confidently at the top as Alphise: she perfectly embodies the enlightened queen in this daring decision to love freely, rejecting the weight of convention.

There is plenty of vocal brilliance: Anastasiya Taratorkina shines as Alphise with her radiant soprano, a proud yet delicate and enchanting queen.

Particularly impressive were the skilfully incorporated coloraturas, which she incorporated into the repetitions of the passages of her arias and thus shone both technically and musically.

The weighing tension of lacing and eruption in the tragically failing incestuous desire of Phédre harbours the danger of a certain boredom. The performance avoids this mainly thanks to the magnificent performances of Ann-Beth Solvang and Anastasiya Taratorkina as her confidante Oenone, who spurs her on to emotional release.

With her soubrette-light soprano, she plays the lively playmaker.

With the winner of the ARD Music Competition for Singing (2021) and her effortlessly soft high notes, the ensemble has gained a true pearl of soprano singing.

which gave the roll an ethereal quality. She was easy to understand and her soprano shone with a velvety colour that gave the audience a real treat. Her crystal-clear voice and precise articulation lent the Waldvogel an enchanting lightness and grace. Especially in the scenes in which she shows Siegfried the way, she created a fairy-tale atmosphere that offered a fascinating contrast to the dark and dramatic moments of the opera.

The young soprano Anastasiya Taratorkina is an event as Gilda. Her voice shines and radiates, never sounding shrill even in the highest trebles. And in the quieter episodes, every phrase, every note is touching.

and (…) complement the ensemble at a high level.

(because this part was simply given far too little attention by Monteverdi).

Her youthful, perfectly focussed soprano aroused curiosity.

which is travelling with lightness and delicate lines into the realm of the dead, where it finds even more intimate lyrical intimacy. Even when she dimmed her exquisite ornamentation down to pianomissimo, you could still hear the warm, flowing sound of her voice. It was precisely the delicate, quiet quality that made it vividly tangible.

A young woman whose childhood ended early due to her family’s poverty and who now leads a love triangle. The most beautiful moment of the evening is the wonderfully lyrical love duet with Jimmy. It gives you goose bumps. Oryx’s expressive high notes are very demanding to sing. Anastasiya Taratorkina expresses the enormous emotional fluctuations of the title heroine movingly with an almost instrumental voice. Her warm, flexible voice, touching depth of soul and beauty of sound are convincing. She seems born for this role.

As the mysterious lover of the two protagonists, the German-Russian soprano effortlessly reaches dizzying heights in the piano.

With her bright, clear soprano, she masters the difficult part seemingly effortlessly. In the trebles without any pressure, the voice carries in all registers and impresses with a high degree of variability in the most difficult interval leaps.

as the precocious MARZELLINE, who, not yet outgrown her schoolgirl uniform, dreams of love and marriage.

She was just as convincing as Norina from Donizetti’s Don Pasquale as she was as Pamina and Anne Trulove from Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress.

Every gesture and every little phrase of the snippy Norina from Gaetano Donizetti’s last opera Don Pasquale was spot on. The deadly pain of Mozart’s Pamina and the supposedly futile struggle for love of Anne Trulove from Igor Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress are touching.

“She has such unstressed and beautiful tones in the piano, very soft!” The chairwoman of the ARD Music Competition jury, Felicity Lott, is delighted with the soprano from Dresden.

The Russian-born singer can apparently completely transform her soprano at will and in no time at all: Fragile and pleading, she embodies Anne Trulove in a scene from Stravinsky’s “The Rake’s Progress”, while her Norina from Donizetti’s “Don Pasquale” is much more bel canto-like and full-bodied. The audience award, which she also received, was a certainty: Even under everyday masks, you can feel how the listeners smile when Anastasiya Taratorkina plays kittenishly with the colouratura.

Every gesture and every little phrase of the snappish Norina from Donizetti’s “Don Pasquale”, the deadly pain of Mozart’s Pamina and the equally supposedly futile struggle for great love of Anne Trulove from Stravinsky’s “The Rake’s Progress”. The first prize and the audience award were more than deserved.

Here we may have heard a successor to the great Antonina Neschdanova, whose recordings are often cited as a reference for the bel canto of the second half of the 19th century. Ms Taratorkina owes her knowledge of bel canto technique and style to her studies with Hendrikje Wangemann at the Dresden University of Music. The sun rose radiantly during her Norina aria from Don Pasquale by Donizetti. Perfect diction, softly intoned top notes at every dynamic level, humour and an economical approach to the exact point of the role made her interpretation an experience. Here, too, there was a spontaneous switch to a suicidal Pamina, who succeeded so intimately, colourfully and in perfect German that after the last notes there was dead silence before the bursting applause. “No word from Tom” from Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress revealed further interesting vocal colours and an astonishingly sonorous depth. Anastasiya Taratorkina is a virtuosa and a name to remember, because she will soon be conquering the big houses as Gilda, Norina and hopefully Zerbinetta too.