• Prize-winner at the 5th Izabella Yuryeva International Competition for Performers of Old Russian Romance (Tallinn, 2004; 1st prize)
• Diploma recipient at the 4th Rimsky-Korsakov International Competition for Young Opera Singers (St Petersburg, 2000; special diploma and prize for the best performance of a work by a 20th century composer)
• Prize-winner at the International Competition for Performance of Roles in The Queen of Spades (Verona, 1999)
Irina Vasilieva was born in Dushanbe, Tajikistan. Graduated from the Rimsky-Korsakov St Petersburg State Conservatory, specialising in composition (class of Sergei Slonimsky, 1993) and vocal art (class of Evgenia Perlasova, 1999).
During 1999–2005 she was a soloist with the Mariinsky Academy of Young Opera Singers. Made her Mariinsky Theatre debut in 2000, appearing as Amore in a concert performance of Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice and subsequently as Wellgunde in the premiere of a new production of Das Rheingold. Since 2005 she has been a soloist with the Mariinsky Opera Company.
Repertoire at the Mariinsky Theatre:
Singer at the Wedding (Dargomyzhsky’s Mermaid)
Parasya (Sorochintsy Fair)
Yaroslavna and a Young Polovtsian Maiden (Prince Igor)
Brigitta (Iolanta, concert performance)
Cook (The Tale of Tsar Saltan)
Domna Ivanovna Saburova (The Tsar’s Bride in concert)
Cook (Le Rossignol)
Parasha (Mavra)
Florid Lady (The Gambler)
Khivrya (Semyon Kotko)
June and September (A Christmas Tale)
Climene (Giovanni Alberto Ristori’s Arianna)
Amore (Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice, concert performance)
Arsinoe (Cimarosa’s La Cleopatra)
Corinna (Il viaggio a Reims)
Anna (Nabucco)
High Priestess (Aida)
Alice Ford (Falstaff)
Musetta (La bohème)
Sister Angelica (Suor Angelica)
Wellgunde (Das Rheingold and Götterdämmerung)
Ortlinde (Die Walküre)
Second Norn (Götterdämmerung)
Echo and Naiad (Ariadne auf Naxos)
Chrysothemis (Elektra)
The Empress (Die Frau ohne Schatten)
Mercédès (Carmen)
Antonia (Les Contes d’Hoffmann)
Governess (The Turn of the Screw)
Jenůfa (Jenůfa)
Emilia Marty (The Makropulos Affair)
Roxana (Król Roger)
Soprano roles in Mozart’s Requiem and Mass in C Minor, Mahler’s Eighth Symphony and Stravinsky’s Les Noces
In 2015 at the Mariinsky Theatre she has sung in the world premiere of Rodion Shchedrin’s opera A Christmas Tale.
Irina Vasilieva’s repertoire also includes the title parts in Madama Butterfly (Cio-Cio-San), Ariadne auf Naxos (the Prima Donna / Ariadne), Iolanta, Norma, Aida, Tosca and Dvořák’s Rusalka, the roles of Agnès Sorel (The Maid of Orleans), Tatiana (Eugene Onegin), Maria (Mazepa), Zemfira (Aleko), Natasha Rostova (War and Peace), Abigaille (Nabucco), Violetta Valéry (La traviata), Leonora (Il trovatore), Maria (Simon Boccanegra), Amelia (Un ballo in maschera), Leonora (La forza del destino), Mimì (La bohème), Teresa (Benvenuto Cellini), Micaëla (Carmen), Giulietta (Les Contes d’Hoffmann), Countess Almaviva (Le nozze di Figaro), Fiordiligi (Così fan tutte), Senta (Der fliegende Holländer), Freia, Ortlinde, Sieglinde and the Third Norn (Der Ring des Nibelungen), the Marschallin (Princess Marie Thérèse von Werdenberg) (Der Rosenkavalier); the soprano parts in Bach’s Weihnachtsoratorium (Christmas Oratorio), Handel’s Messiah, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Verdi’s and Karamanov’s Requiems; Richard Strauss’ song cycle Vier letzte Lieder.
Irina Vasilieva has toured to the USA, Finland, Germany and Great Britain, singing at venues such as the Théâtre du Châtelet (Paris), the New Israeli Opera (Tel Aviv) and London’s Barbican Hall. In September 2000 together with Plácido Domingo she performed Act II from Parsifal at a concert at the Dorothy Pavilion (Los Angeles), and in 2006 she appeared with a solo programme at the Glenn Gould Studio (Toronto). Irina Vasilieva has collaborated with such conductors as Alexander Kantorov, Evgeny Bushkov, Yuri Bashmet, Gary Bertini, Kristofer Wåhlander, Daniele Rustioni and Esa-Pekka Salonen; she has performed with the Helsinki Philharmonic and Los Angeles Symphony orchestras.
Together with Larisa Gabitova the singer brought back to the musical stage Giovanni Alberto Ristori’s opera Arianna (1736), which was considered lost, and directed its concert performances (St Petersburg State Capella, 2012; Bip Castle, Pavlovsk, 2013) and productions (Tsaritsyn Opera, Volgograd, and Cherepovets Municipal Chamber Theatre, 2014; New Stage of the Alexandrinsky Theatre, 2017) as well as its semi-staged performance at the Mariinsky Theatre (2025).
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