Giulia Montanari

The Italian soprano Giulia Montanari grew up in Germany and has established herself as a versatile interpreter of the lyric and coloratura repertoire. Her radiant, secure high register soprano moves confidently between Mozart, the Baroque, Belcanto and contemporary music. Her artistic path led her as an ensemble member to the Aalto-Theater Essen and, from the 2022/23 season, to the Oper Köln.

A particular highlight of the 2026/27 season is her role debut as Sophie in Richard Strauss’ Der Rosenkavalier, the major opening production marking the resumption of performances at the Kölner Opernhaus (musical direction: Andrés Orozco-Estrada; direction: Marie-Ève Signeyrole). Another important role debut is the double role of Olympia and Giulietta in the new production of Offenbach’s Hoffmanns Erzählungen (musical direction: Andrés Orozco-Estrada; direction: Stefan Herheim). In the next premiere of the Kölner Ring cycle, she will also make her debut as the Forest Bird in Wagner’s Siegfried (musical direction: Felix Bender; direction: Paul-Georg Dittrich). In revivals of Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte, she will once again take on the role of the Queen of the Night, as well as Fortuna and Drusilla in Monteverdi’s Die Krönung der Poppea. In the field of music theatre for young audiences, she will also perform the title role in Igor Stravinsky’s Die Nachtigall.

In the 2025/26 season, Giulia Montanari appeared as Woglinde in the opening production of the new Kölner Ring cycle (Rheingold) (musical direction: Marc Albrecht; direction: Paul-Georg Dittrich), as Michal in Händel’s Saul (musical direction: Rubén Dubrovsky; direction: Barrie Kosky), and as Barbarina in Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro (musical direction: Andrés Orozco-Estrada; direction: Katharina Thoma). Further highlights included revivals in the roles of Clorinda in Rossini’s La Cenerentola and the Queen of the Night in Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte. On the concert platform, she performed Bach’s Matthäus-Passion at the Bonner Beethovenhalle under the musical direction of Attilio Cremonesi.

Her repertoire at the Oper Köln also includes Ascagne (Berlioz’s Les Troyens), Cleopatra (Giulio Cesare), Blonde (Die Entführung aus dem Serail), the Guardian, the Voice at the Threshold of the Temple and Falke (Die Frau ohne Schatten), as well as Angelica (Orlando) and Zerlina (Don Giovanni). She also appeared in a staged new production of Haydn’s Die Schöpfung.

As an ensemble member of the Aalto-Theater Essen, she likewise interpreted numerous central roles in her repertoire, including Euridice (Orfeo ed Euridice), Adele (Die Fledermaus), Sandrina (La finta giardiniera), Belinda and First Witch (Dido and Aeneas), as well as Fiakermilli (Arabella).

Over the course of her career to date, she has also worked with conductors such as Herbert Blomstedt, Stefan Parkman, Anu Tali, Mariss Jansons, Ulf Schirmer, Peter Dijkstra, Hans-Christoph Rademann, François-Xavier Roth, Roberto Rizzi Brignoli, Andrea Sanguineti, Matteo Beltrami, Marc Minkowski and Tomáš Netopil, as well as with directors such as Guy Joosten, Roland Schwab, Ted Huffmann, Ben Baur, Johannes Erath, Cecilia Ligorio and Vincent Boussard.

Alongside her work on the opera stage, Giulia Montanari devotes herself intensively to the concert repertoire. Her repertoire ranges from early Baroque works to contemporary music and includes, among others, Mozart’s Requiem and Krönungsmesse, Rossini’s Petite Messe Solennelle, Telemann’s Lukas-Passion, Orff’s Carmina Burana and Rutter’s Requiem.

Giulia Montanari studierte Musikwissenschaft und Sprachen an der Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München sowie Gesang an der Hochschule für Musik Franz Liszt Weimar in der Klasse von Prof. Siegfried Gohritz. Beim Internationalen Gesangswettbewerb in Imola, Italien, wurde sie im Juni 2018 mit zwei Preisen ausgezeichnet.

Her artistic career began at the Deutsches Nationaltheater Weimar, where she made her debut while still a student and appeared, among other roles, as Papagena (Die Zauberflöte), Sandman and Dew Fairy (Hänsel und Gretel), as well as in Jörn Arnecke’s Der Eisblumenwald. In the 2019/20 season, she was accepted into the Opernstudio NRW and appeared as a guest at several German stages, including the Oper Dortmund, the Oper Wuppertal and the Musiktheater im Revier Gelsenkirchen.