Alagna, Roberto
Alagna, Roberto
Alagna, Roberto, prominent Italian tenor; b. Clichy-sur-Bois, France, June 7, 1963. He received vocal training from Raphael Ruiz. In 1988 he won the Pavar-otti Competition in Philadelphia and then made his operatic debut with the Glyndebourne Touring Opera in Plymouth as Alfredo. His first appearance at London’s Covent Garden followed in 1990 as Rodolfo. In 1991 he made his debut at Milan’s La Scala as Alfredo. Following an engagement as Roberto Devereux in Monte Carlo in 1992, he returned to Covent Garden as Gounod’s Roméo in 1994. He sang the Duke of Mantua at his debut at the Vienna State Opera in 1995, the same yearhe sang Edgardo at the Opéra de la Bastille in Paris. He returned to Paris in 1996 as Don Carlos at the Théâtre du Châtelet. On April 10, 1996, he made his debut at the Metropolitan Opera in N.Y. as Rodolfo. Shortly afterward he married Angela Gheorghiu, and then returned to the Metropolitan Opera that year as Nemorino and the Duke of Mantua and to Covent Garden as Don Carlos and Alfredo. In 1997 he was engaged as Macduff at La Scala. He sang Roméo to Gheorghiu’s Juliette at the Metropolitan Opera in 1998 to notable acclaim, roles they reprised at the Lyric Opera in Chicago in 1999.
—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire