Sonya Yoncheva

Sonya Yoncheva (Соня Йончева; born 25 December 1981) is a Bulgarian operatic soprano, producer and founder of SY11 Productions company.

Yoncheva was born in Plovdiv, Bulgaria.

She studied piano and voice at the National School for Music and Dance in Plovdiv.

During her teenage years, she hosted a Bulgarian television show about music.

She won several music competitions in Bulgaria in 2000 and 2001, including a joint win with her brother as "Singers of the Year 2000" in the "Hit-1" competition organised and produced by Bulgarian National Television.

Yoncheva was an invited participant in William Christie's "Jardin des Voix" academy for young singers in 2007.

She has continued work in the baroque repertoire with Christie, and also with Emmanuelle Haïm.

She took advanced studies in classical singing with Danielle Borst at the Conservatoire de Musique de Genève and obtained the master's degree in 2009.

Yoncheva was the female first-place winner of the 2010 Operalia competition and the special CulturArte prize.

In May 2011, she portrayed Cleopatra in a co-production of Giulio Cesare by the and, performances of which also took place at the Royal Opera of Versailles.

In June she performed in L'elisir d'amore as Adina as part of Festival Nuits Musicales Sainte Victoire in Peynier.

Her debut at the Metropolitan Opera was in November 2013 when she stepped in as Gilda in Rigoletto, in advance of her previously scheduled official debut.

In 2014 at the Met, she sang her stage role debut as Mimì (La bohème) in November and shared the role of Violetta (La traviata) in December.

In 2015 she appeared as Desdemona in the season opening production of Otello the Metropolitan Opera and in September 2016 she made her debut as Norma at the Royal Opera House, where she sang Antonia in Les contes d'Hoffmann in November of the same year.

In June 2017 she made her debut at the Teatro alla Scala as Mimì in La bohème.

She made her role debut in the title role of Puccini's Tosca at the Metropolitan Opera for their 2017/18 season to great critical acclaim.

Yoncheva set a record as first singer to appear in leading roles in three movie-theater broadcasts of the Metropolitan Opera in one season (Tosca, Mimi in La bohème and Luisa Miller in the 2017/18 season).

Other role debuts in the 2017/18 season include Luisa Miller at the Metropolitan Opera and Élisabeth de Valois in Don Carlos at the Paris Opera.

For her role debut as Imogene in Bellini's Il Pirata at the Teatro alla Scala in June 2018, the first production of the piece after a legendary 1958 staging with Maria Callas as Imogene the press proclaimed that her performance would "surely see Yoncheva enter La Scala's hall of fame alongside Callas".

In summer 2018 Yoncheva sang the role of Poppea in L'incoronazione di Poppea at the Salzburg Festival.

Yoncheva began the 2018/19 season performing the title role of Médée in a staging at Staatsoper Berlin conducted by Daniel Barenboim.

Other performances in 2018/19 included Desdemona in Verdi's Otello and the title part of Iolanta at the Metropolitan Opera, Desdemona in a new production for Festspielhaus Baden-Baden and at the Berlin Philharmonic Hall as well as Tosca at Staatsoper Berlin.

In the spring of 2019, Sonya Yoncheva announced that she was expecting her second child in the coming fall as a result of which she did not perform from mid July to November 2019.

She returned to the stage for the concerts of the Puccini Gala at the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg, the Tchaikovsky Hall in Moscow, and in Sofia.

In the 2019/20 season, she performed Mimì in La bohème at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, the title role of Médée at the Staatsoper Berlin and as Imogene in Il Pirata to the Teatro Real in Madrid.

Several important role debuts in the 2019/20 and 2020/21 season had to be cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, among them her first Manon Lescaut, Leonora in Il trovatore and Rusalka at the Metropolitan Opera as well as Fedora at the Teatro alla Scala (but she actually sang Fedora at Scala in 2022).

In spring 2020, Yoncheva returned to the stage after the first European lockdown as the soprano soloist of Ludwig van Beethoven's 9th Symphony at the Victoria Hall in Geneva, telecast by Arte.

She also participated in the 2020 edition of Le Concert de Paris in front of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, performed the title role of La traviata at the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino and appeared in concert at the Salzburg Festival, at the Arena di Verona, in Lucca and Caserta.

In summer 2020, Sonya Yoncheva and Rolex announced a concert series in aid of musicians affected by the pandemic and the ongoing cancellations.

Yoncheva was the host of the "Perpetual Music" concert at the Staatsoper Unter den Linden in Berlin in September, featuring 14 singers and instrumentalists.

Engagements until the end of 2020 included solo concerts to open the season of the Würth Philharmoniker and the Antwerp Symphony Orchestra, the title role of Tosca at the Bayerische Staatsoper, the Season Inauguration Gala A Riveder le Stelle of the Teatro alla Scala and a Christmas concert hosted by the German president Frank-Walter Steinmeier and telecast by ZDF.

Sonya Yoncheva began the year 2021 starring in the Metropolitan Opera's "Met Stars Live in Concert" streaming concert series, which saw her singing arias and songs from the Schussenried Abbey in Germany.

On French television, she appeared in "Fauteils d'Orchestre" on France 5, before embarking on a series of recitals and concerts throughout Spain, which brought her to Valencia, Bilbao and Madrid, where she performed her first Zarzuela concert at the Teatro de la Zarzuela.

With the NOSPR led by her husband Domingo Hindoyan, Yoncheva sang Henri Duparc "L'Invitation Au Voyage" in Katowice, before starring in the title role of Tosca at the Wiener Staatsoper.

In June, she took part in the Gala "Musiques en Fête" at the Chorégies d'Orange, telecast by France 3.

Sonya Yoncheva's busy summer season also included Stephana in Umberto Giordano rarity Siberia at the Maggio Musicale in Florence, a production of La traviata at the Arena di Verona that was recorded for telecasts on ZDF and 3sat, recitals and concerts in Toulouse, Munich, Baden-Baden, Ljubljana, Montpellier, Sofia, Bucharest and the Salzburg Festival.

In the Fall, she made her role debut as Puccini's Manon Lescaut at the Staatsoper Hamburg, returned to Zürich as Tosca, to the Staatsoper Unter den Linden as Mimi in La bohème and appeared in more solo concerts and recitals in Paris, Aarhus, Bucharest, Genève, Athens, Budapest, Barcelona, Moscow and at the Teatro alla Scala.

In January 2022, Sonya Yoncheva joined the very select rank of opera stars to have appeared in Recital at the Metropolitan Opera, presenting her program "Ad una Stella" with Malcolm Martineau, followed by performances as Élisabeth de Valois in the Met's first ever staging of Verdi's Don Carlos in five acts and in French.

At the Festspielhaus Baden-Baden, Sonya Yoncheva performed the title role of Iolanta with the Berlin Philharmonic and Kirill Petrenko, at the Teatro Real of Madrid Stephana in Siberia, at the Gran Teatre del Liceu of Barcelona Norma, and at the Teatro alla Scala, she sang her first Fedora in a new production.

In concert and recital, Sonya Yoncheva also appeared at the Gran Teatre del Liceu, at the Berliner Philharmonie, in Liverpool, Tokyo, Munich, Peralada, Versailles, Lyon and Munich.