Official Biography
Sondra Radvanovsky is a globally renowned soprano, celebrated as “one of the most profoundly moving opera artists on the planet” (Operawire). She is widely regarded as one of the finest living Verdi and Puccini sopranos, and is among the world’s preeminent interpreters of the bel canto repertoire.
In the 2025/26 season, Ms. Radvanovsky brings her “extraordinary” (New York Times) portrayal of Puccini’s Tosca to stages around the world, including Teatro di San Carlo, the Opéra National de Paris, and Slovenia’s Ljubljana Festival. She will also return to another iconic role, Cherubini’s riveting Medea, bowing again in David McVicar’s lush production at Lyric Opera of Chicago, and she brings her signature performance of Puccini’s Turandot to the Bayerische Staatsoper.
On the concert stage, Ms. Radvanovsky will join the American Symphony Orchestra for a star-studded Christmas Night Opera Gala at Carnegie Hall, and will appear alongside tenor Freddie De Tommaso at the Teatro di San Carlo for a program of works by Verdi, Puccini, and Mascagni. She will also perform songs and arias in recital at the Palau de la Música in Barcelona, accompanied by pianist Vincenzo Scalera.
Highlights from last season include Tosca at Deutsche Oper Berlin and The Metropolitan Opera, a performance praised as “legendary” by Operawire. Ms. Radvanovsky also starred as Odabella in Verdi’s Attila in concert at the Teatro Real, as Maddalena di Coigny in Giordano’s Andrea Chenier at Deutsche Oper Berlin, and as Turandot at London’s Royal Ballet and Opera, where she showed “why she is the reigning Turandot of the day” (Guardian). She also embarked on a concert tour with tenor Piotr Beczała, singing programs of arias and duets from various operas.
Ms. Radvanovsky has been widely celebrated for her performances of Verdi’s beloved heroines, including the title role in Aida, Leonora in La forza del destino, Lady Macbeth in Macbeth, Amelia in Un ballo in maschera, Elvira in Ernani, Leonora in Il trovatore, Elisabetta in Don Carlo, Hélène in Les vêpres siciliennes, and more. Her portrayals of Puccini’s most fiery women have also received rave reviews. She is regarded as “one of the best Toscas today” (Operawire), and has triumphed as Turandot, Suor Angelica, and Manon Lescaut . Ms. Radvanovsky’s diverse repertoire also includes Donizetti’s “Three Queens”: Anna Bolena, Maria Stuarda, and Elisabetta in Roberto Devereux, as well as the title role in Bellini’s Norma, Roxane in Alfano’s Cyrano de Bergerac, the title role in Dvořák’s Rusalka, and Lisa in Tchaikovsky’s Pique Dame.
Ms. Radvanovsky’s debut album Verdi Arias was released in 2010 on the Delos label. The album quickly became a critical hit and made several season-best lists, including those of NPR and The New Yorker. In 2011, Delos released a CD of Verdi opera scenes with Radvanovsky and her frequent artistic partner, the late Dmitri Hvorostovsky, recorded with the Philharmonia of Russia and Constantine Orbelian. Recent highlights of her discography include the release of Warner Classics’s new recording of Turandot, accompanied by the Orchestra and Chorus of the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia under the baton of Antonio Pappano, and The Three Queens, which features the finales of Donizetti’s Tudor trilogy, recorded live at the Lyric Opera of Chicago.
Radvanovsky’s portrayals have been broadly captured on screen. She stars in a Naxos DVD of Cyrano de Bergerac, and in Il trovatore, Un ballo in maschera, Roberto Devereux, and Medea for The Met: Live in HD series. She has also been an enthusiastic host for the Live in HD transmissions of La fanciulla del West, Otello, and Francesca da Rimini.
Ms. Radvanovsky trained at The Metropolitan Opera in the late 1990s as part of the Lindemann Young Artist Development Program. After performances in smaller roles there, she caught the attention of critics as Antonia in Les Contes d’Hoffmann and was singled out as a soprano to watch. Since then, she has performed in every major opera house in the world, including the Royal Opera House, Teatro alla Scala, The Met, Opernhaus Zürich, and numerous others, and has appeared in concert with leading orchestras and collaborators. Beyond the operatic stage, Sondra Radvanovsky has appeared in recital at Carnegie Hall, the Centro de congresos in Andorra, Barcelona’s Liceu, the Aix-en-Provence Festival, Cankarjev Dom in Ljubljana, and at Spivey Hall in Georgia.