Dmitri Hvorostovsky

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

Dmitri Hvorostovsky was a Russian opera baritone, born in 1962 in Krasnoyarsk in Siberia, a city that was then largely closed to foreigners. He grew up as an only child, largely with his grandparents, because his father, an engineer, and his mother, a gynaecologist, were rarely at home. In 1989 he gained international fame when he won the BBC Cardiff Singer of the World, beating the Welsh favourite Bryn Terfel in the final, with, among other pieces, Ombra mai fu by Handel and an aria from Verdi's Don Carlos.

Music and breakthrough

His opera debut in the West followed in 1989 in Nice, in Tchaikovsky's The Queen of Spades. In Italy he made his name as Eugene Onegin at La Fenice. In 1992 he made his debut at Covent Garden in Bellini's I puritani, in 1993 in Chicago in La traviata and in 1995 at the Metropolitan Opera. He later sang in virtually all the great opera houses, including the Berlin State Opera, La Scala and the Vienna State Opera. His interpretation of Eugene Onegin in particular was acclaimed; The New York Times wrote that he was born for that role. In 2003 he gave a recital at the Kremlin Palace in Moscow with new arrangements of songs from the Second World War, which was watched on Russian television by more than ninety million viewers. In his later years he sang almost only Verdi. He died in 2017 in London of brain cancer.

Influence

Hvorostovsky was one of the best-known Russian singers of his generation and brought the Russian singing tradition to the international opera stage.

Listening