Eleonora Buratto

Eleonora Buratto has emerged onto the international opera stage as “the most precious and complete soprano that the Italian school has produced in recent years” (Il Foglio, 2022).

Her interpretations are seen as a point of reference in a repertoire that ranges from Belcanto to Puccini. Her career progression has been gradual but unstoppable, from her start as Creusa in Demofoonte conducted by Riccardo Muti, to her leading roles in recent years in the most prestigious theatres worldwide: Donizetti’s Anna Bolena and Maria Stuarda, Elisabetta in DonCarlo and Desdemona in Otello by Verdi, Puccini’s Madama Butterfly, Suor Angelica and Tosca.

She began the current year in Venice, starring in the New Year Concert at La Fenice, going on to sing as Amelia in Simon Boccanegra at Teatro alla Scala, as Tosca (debut) at the Bayerische Staatsoper, in the worldwide broadcast of the concert for the opening of the2024 Arena Festival, in the concert entitled Puccini secondo Muti broadcast worldwide from Lucca, in the Belcanto Concert at the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro, Madama Butterfly at the Opéra Bastille, in a concert performance of Tosca for the opening of the season at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia (new music director Daniel Harding’s inaugural concerts, also recorded for Deutsche Grammophon) and Amelia in Simon Boccanegra for the opening of the season at the Opera di Roma. In 2025 she will again perform as Mimì at the Metropolitan Opera. Following this, she will sing at the Staatskapelle Dresden in the Verdi Requiem conducted by Daniele Gatti, as Madama Butterfly under the baton of Kirill Petrenko in both a staged version at the Baden-Baden Easter Festival and a concert performance at the Philharmonie Berlin, in Roberto Devereux at the Palau de Les Arts to complete her debuts in the three “Tudor operas” at the Valencia theatre, and as Leonora in Il Trovatore at the London Royal Ballet and Opera.

Several distinguishing events stand out in her career, which has taken her to major theatres worldwide, from the Metropolitan Opera to La Scala, from the Teatro Real to the Wiener Staatsoper, from the Opera di Roma to the Bayerische Staatsoper. There is, for example, her longstanding cooperation with Maestro Muti, with whom she has also sung as Susanna in the opera I Due Figaro by Mercadante, Norina in Don Pasquale, Amelia in Simon Boccanegra, Alice in Falstaff, Countess Almaviva in Le Nozze di Figaro, and Aida, and in several concerts and gala performances. As a result of her roles in Mozart’s three Da Ponte operas and as Elettra in Idomeneo, re di Creta, she has risen to become one of the most greatly appreciated Mozart performers. The year 2015 marked a turning point, when she sang for the first time as Corinna in Il Viaggio a Reims at the Dutch National Opera in Amsterdam, as Liù, as Countess Almaviva, and lastly inaugurated the season at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples, singing as Micaela in Carmen conducted by Zubin Mehta. From 2016 to today, she has made other debuts which have since become signature roles in her repertoire, such as Mimì, Donna Anna, Elettra in Idomeneo, Luisa Miller, Elvira in Ernani, Fiordiligi, Desdemona in Verdi’s Otello, Anaï in Moïse et Pharaon, Madama Butterfly, Desdemona in Rossini’s Otello, Anna Bolena, Elisabetta in Don Carlo, Antonia in Les Contes d’Hoffmann, Suor Angelica and Maria Stuarda.  

Her symphonic repertoire has grown over the years, with concert performances and also recordings that include the Rossini Messa di Gloria at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia conducted by Antonio Pappano (the recording of which was winner of the 2023 International Classical Music Awards in the "Choral Music” category and of the Abbiati Record Award), the Verdi Requiem and Four sacred pieces, the Mahler Symphony no. 4, the Rossini Stabat Mater and Petite Messe Solennelle conducted by Gustavo Gimeno (the latter released on cd by Pentatone in 2019). In summer 2020, she sang in Bergamo before the President of Italy in the Donizetti Requiem in a concert to commemorate the victims of the pandemic. On 7th December 2020, she was one of the artists in the special concert entitled “A riveder le stelle” to mark the opening of the season at Teatro alla Scala behind closed doors but with an Italian and international television audience.

Committed to social work, it decided to produce the Butterfly Gala in support of the non-profit organisation Debra Family, which assists so-called ‘butterfly children’. The first edition of the gala was held in 2023 at the Teatro Comunale Pavarotti Freni in Modena, the second will be held at the Teatro Sociale di Como in autumn 2024, both with the support of artist friends, the theatres themselves and various patrons.
Global ambassador of ‘Tebaldi 100’ and the Renata Tebaldi Museum in Busseto, she is committed to events in memory of Tebaldi.

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Winner of the Abbiati Prize of the National Association of Music Critics as ‘Best Singer 2021’, she has received various other awards including the Pesaro Music Award and the Rossini d'oro.
On 27 December 2022, President Mattarella appointed her Cavaliere al Merito della Repubblica Italiana: the honour was presented to her during the Festa della Repubblica on 2 June 2023, after she had sung the Inno d'Italia during the parade at the Imperial Forums.