Maria Chulkova Soprano

Maria Chulkova was born in Togliatti (Russia). She graduated with honors from the College of the Togliatti Institute of Art with specialties: piano (class of assistant professor L. Evstigneeva) and voice (class of Professor G. Sorokina). She began at the Saint-Petersburg Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatory in 2004 in the studio of professor E. Gorokhovskaya.

Maria studied in Sulmona, Italy in a course organized by Opera Theater Sulmona in 2008-2009. In 2009 she graduated with honors from the Saint-Petersburg Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatory. From 2009-2010 she was a student of the Scuola dell'opera Italiana (Bologna, Italy).

She was an award winner in the International S. Rakhmaninov Competition (Saint-Petersburg 2005). Maria was a Prize-winner of the 3rd National G. Swiridov Competition (Kursk, Russia 2007). She won third prize of the 25th International Maria Caniglia Competition (Sulmona, Italy  2008).

In 2010 Maria has been a finalist and stipend winner of the Concorso Internazionale di canto lirico Giovanni Martinelli-Aureliano Pertile (Montagnana, Italy 2010) and a finalist of the International Montserrat Caballe Competition (Zaragoza, Spain 2010).

Ms Chulkova, as a recitalist, has performed in the Russian cities of Saint-Petersburg, Moscow, Togliatti, Orel and given concerts in Sulmona, Aquila, Palermo, Italy. She has sung various roles at the Rimsky Korsakov Theater in Saint Petersburg including Princess|Ognivo by T. Kogan in 2007; Belinda|Dido and Aeneas in 2008 as well as Despina|Cosi fan tutte, and Tatiana in Alexei Stepanyuk's 2009 production of Eugene Onegin.

Since 2011 she has been a permanent member of Stadttheater Gießen, where she gave her debut with Countess|Le Nozze di Figaro. In 2011-12 season she will perform in Gießen as Mimi|La Bohème, in Maria Tudor, as Mathilde|Guillaume Tell and again as Contessa.