Diana Lamar | Soprano
Diana Lamar opened her 2023/2024 season with her most sung role : Elektra in Richard Strauss’ masterpiece in South Korea at the Daegu Opera House. For this performance, Diana Lamar received an award in the Best New Singer category by the prestigious Saya Opera Awards. This performance was held on the 21st of October 2023 and was a Co-Production between the Daegu Opera House and Sofia Opera and Ballet. For the role of Elektra, critics praised Ms. Lamar for her “beauty of tone and dynamic phrasing” (Klaus Billand, Online Merker) and “powerful and nuanced dramaticism” (Ekaterina Docheva). Ms.Lamar will be Senta in Der fliegende Holländer by Wagner this upcoming season at China’s National Centre for the Performing Arts and she sang the role of Medea by Luigi Cherubini for the National Premier in Bulgaria, at the Sofia Opera and Ballet. She will also sing the role of Santuzza in Cavalleria rusticana by Mascagni and the role of Nedda in Pagliacci by Leoncavallo at Opera Wrocławska in April and May 2024, the role of Tosca with the Filharmonia Pomorska in Poland in May 2024 and the role of La Traviata in Graz and Klagenfurt during the summer 2024.
In July 2024 Diana Lamar will sing with star tenor Roberto Alagna, Marina Viotti and Ruben Amoretti for the closure of the Paleo Festival in Switzerland.
Some highlights of Ms.Lamar’s 2022/2023 season are her debut as Elle in La Voix Humaine by Poulenc under the stage direction of Renata Scotto in Savona and Sanremo with the Teatro dell’opera Giocosa and the Sinfonico di Sanremo conducted by Matteo Beltrami. A few weeks prior to that, Ms.Lamar sang Liza in Pique Dame by Tchaikovsky at the Sofia Opera and Ballet directed by Vera Petrova and conducted by Andrey Galanov. She also sang Floria Tosca by Puccini at the Theater Trier and in Italy at the Teatro Vittorio Emanuele di Messina and Judith in Le Château de Barbe-Bleu by Bartók with the Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana in Palermo.
Other highlights of Ms. Lamar’s 2021/2022 season are her house debut at the Hessisches Staatstheater Wiesbaden in the title role of Elektra by Strauss, her Senta in Der Fliegende Holländer by Wagner at the Sofia Opera and Ballet and her debut as Abigaille in Nabucco by Verdi in Austria, Graz.
Soprano Diana Lamar returned to the Sofia Opera and Ballet in the season 2021/2022 to reprise her performance in the title role of Strauss’s Elektra in a production by Plamen Kartalov under the baton of Maestro Evan-Alexis Christ which she debuted in November 2020 during national premiere to immense critical acclaim. In January 2022, Ms Lamar sang Elektra in Palermo under the direction of Marcus Bosch with the Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana and at the Deutsche Oper Berlin, she covered the role of Els in Schrecker’s Der Schatzgräber, also making her house debut in the role of Floria Tosca in the 7 Deaths of Maria Callas with Marina Abramovic at the Deutsche Oper Berlin. Another highlight of Ms Lamar’s 2021/2022 season was her highly anticipated role debut as Tatyana in Tchaikovsky’s Onegin at the Sofia Opera and Ballet and her debut as Elsa in Wagner’s Lohengrin at the Bucharest National Opera. The most recent concert engagement in Ms. Lamar’s 2021/2022 season took place in Italy, Pesaro on the 7th of August 2022, where she was invited by the Wunderkammer Orchestra to sing a recital of italian arias by Verdi, Puccini, Cilea and Rossini called Tebaldi100 Omaggio a Renata Tebaldi. For this occasion, Ms. Lamar was accompanied by Lorenzo Bavaj, the pianist of José Carreras since 1989.
Ms. Lamar’s operatic repertoire includes works by Wagner, Strauss, Puccini, Verdi and Tchaikovsky. Highlights of previous seasons include Der Trommler in Viktor Ullmann’s Der Kaiser von Atlantis, Gabriel Schutz in Weigmann’s Der Klarinettenmacher, Sylva Varesco in Emmerich Kalman‘s Die Csàrdàsfürstin, Gretel in Humperdinck’s Hänsel und Gretel, Micaëla in Carmen at the Ganizate Festival and Une bergère in Rameau’s Naïs under the baton of Christophe Rousset for the Britten-Pears Centenary at the Aldeburgh Festival in Snape Maltings, England.
Equally at home on the concert stage Ms. Lamar’s performaces of note include Vier Letzte Lieder of Strauss under the baton of Daniel Kawka with the OSE Orchestra in the Auditorium Stranivski, Montreux, Schubert Mass D.105 at the BOZAR with the National Orchestra of Belgium under the baton of Christopher Warren-Green, Mahler Rückert Lieder and Vivaldi Nisi Dominus with the BOHO Players under the baton of David Ramael and Messa di Gloria Poulenc with the Lausanne Sinfonietta, under the baton of Yves Bugnon. Ms. Lamar has also given numerous recitals in Switzerland, England, Germany, France, Belgium and Cyprus, with repertoire including Poèmes pour Mi by Olivier Messiaen, Shéhérazade by Ravel, The Poet’s Echo by Britten, La Dame de Monte-Carlo by Poulenc and other french, german and russian art songs.
A skilled musician, Ms. Lamar is passionate about contemporary music and has performed in numerous ENOA projects including the Three Voices by Morton Feldman, under the baton of Bassem Akiki and stage director Sjaron Minailo in a co-production with Théâtre Royale de la Monnaie. She also sang regularly with the Ensemble Intercomunicazione for Baroque and contemporary music projects: several world premieres of Johan Treichel, works by Daniel Zea like Lagrimas de Crocodilo , as well as works by Eric Gaudibert.
Ms. Lamar has been awarded numerous scholarships and grants, including the MARIA CALLAS Tribute Prize in New York City in 2019, 1st prize at the Concorso Internazionale per Cantanti Lirici “Città di Alcamo” 2018, the 2010 & 2011 Fritz-Gerber Stiftung Grant, the 2009 Pour-cent Culturel Migros Grant, the 2010 Lyra Stiftung Grant, and the 2007 Grand Concours de la “Pierre d’Or” in Switzerland.
From 2011 until 2015, Ms. Lamar was a soloist in residence at the Chapelle Musicale Reine Elisabeth under the direction of José Van Dam in Belgium. During her residency, she participated in concerts and masterclasses with renowned artists like Helmut Deutsch, Ian Bostridge, Julius Drake, Helen Donath, Inga Kalna, Tom Krause, June Anderson, Luca Scarlini, Anita Garanca and Olga Pasychnik. Specialization in the italian repertoire is coached by Alessandra Rossi and Bruno De Simone. Ms. Lamar holds dual Masters degrees in Vocal Performance and Vocal Pedagogy from the Haute Ecole de Musique de Genève, Switzerland. Diana Lamar is a Bulgarian-Swiss soprano, who was born in Bulgaria, grew up in Egypt in a musician’s family, studied singing in Switzerland, Italy, Brussels, New York, Paris and Vienna. In addition to her extensive training, Ms Lamar speaks French, German, Italian, English, Russian, Bulgarian and Arabic. She currently resides in Lausanne, Switzerland.