Olga Alexandrovna Peretyatko was born in Leningrad on 21 May 1980 to a Ukrainian father who sang in the chorus of the Mariinsky Theatre. She spent part of her childhood in Visaginas, Lithuania, returning to her native city in 1995 to join the Mariinsky Children’s Choir while studying choral conducting at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory. Originally taken for a mezzo-soprano, she moved to the soprano repertoire after beginning private study in 2000, and in 2002 was admitted to the Hochschule fur Musik Hanns Eisler in Berlin. She went on to the Young Artists’ Programme of the Hamburg State Opera and to the Rossini Opera Festival, where she worked closely with the conductor and scholar Alberto Zedda.

Second prize at Placido Domingo’s Operalia competition in 2007 brought her a Paris debut at the Theatre des Champs-Elysees, and her performance of the title role in Stravinsky’s The Nightingale in 2009 established her internationally. She made her Vienna State Opera debut in 2013 and her Metropolitan Opera debut in 2014, and has become closely identified with lyric and coloratura roles in Rossini and Mozart. In more recent seasons she has taken on heavier and more lyrical parts, broadening her repertoire toward Verdi and Puccini. She records for major labels and appears regularly with leading European orchestras and opera houses.

Sources:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olga_Peretyatko