Russian soprano singer Aida Garifullina was born in Kazan, capital of Tatarstan, on September 30, 1987. With a first name predestined for opera, this daughter of a choirmaster studied at the University of Nuremberg at the age of eighteen, then at the Vienna Academy of Music, where she made her debut in Mozart's opera Cosi fan tutte. After winning the 2010 Magomayev Singing Competition in Moscow, she sang at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, before joining the Mariinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg to work with conductor Valery Gergiev. Her Italian opera repertoire has expanded to include roles such as Donizetti's L'Elixir d'amour and Verdi's Rigoletto. In 2013, she won first prize in the Operalia Competition, and the following year made her debut at London's Wigmore Hall. In 2015, she sang the role of Lily Pons and the famous "Air des clochettes", from Léo Delibes' opera Lakmé, in Stephen Frears' film Florence Foster Jenkins. Signed by the Decca label, Aida Garifullina records her first recital named after her first name, Aida (2017), featuring some fifteen arias performed by the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Cornelius Meister.
