Rihab Chaieb makes her debut at LIFE Victoria with a musical dialogue between East and West
The mezzo-soprano Rihab Chaieb, born in Tunisia and raised in Montreal since the age of two, makes her debut at LIFE Victoria alongside pianist Brian Zeger, Head of the Vocal Arts Department at The Juilliard School in New York.
The recital, entitled Clash Between East and West, will take place on Friday, February 6 at the Sant Pau Art Nouveau Site at 8:00 PM. The programme offers a musical reflection on the dialogue and tension between the two cultures, through the lens of French composers fascinated by Orientalism, such as Maurice Ravel, Camille Saint-Saëns, Georges Bizet, Louise Aubert, Henri Duparc and Osvaldo Golijov, in contrast with traditional Arabic songs such as Lamma Bada Yatathanna and Kelmti Horra.
Raised in an Arabic family environment, Chaieb developed from a very young age a deep affinity with traditional Eastern music. With a rapidly rising career, she has established herself as one of the most outstanding emerging voices on the operatic and Lied scene, after beginning her career as a member of the Lindemann Young Artist Program at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. At the Met, she has taken part in productions such as La italiana in Algeri, Luisa Miller, Cavalleria rusticana and Hänsel und Gretel, and returned as a guest artist in Don Giovanni, under the direction of Cornelius Meister.
This season, Chaieb will perform with the Canadian Opera Company and the Bayerische Staatsoper, and will appear with the Barcelona Symphony Orchestra and National Orchestra of Catalonia in Stravinsky’s L’Ocell de Foc and Ravel’s L’Enfant et les sortilèges, on June 12.
LIFE New Artists: Dalila Lugo
As usual, LIFE Victoria reaffirms its commitment to promoting and supporting new voices on the international opera scene, offering a prominent platform to promising young talents. On this occasion, the series will feature the American soprano Dalila Lugo, an artist of great sensitivity and a promising career, who has taken part in the Victoria de los Ángeles Legacy programme at the prestigious Juilliard School in New York, and who makes her debut at LIFE Victoria accompanied by Zeger himself.
The Victoria de los Ángeles Legacy programme, which the Foundation has offered in New York since the soprano’s centenary, consists of coaching sessions in Spanish and Catalan repertoire taught by mezzo-soprano Nancy Fabiola Herrera, Honorary Patron of the Foundation and a Juilliard alumna.