Francesca Lombardi Mazzulli brilliantly graduated at the Conservatory G. Verdi of Milan and earned her second academic degree with distinction at the Conservatory G. Frescobaldi of Ferrara under the guidance of Mirella Freni. After that she continued her studies with Luciano Pavarotti, A. Molinari and with Sonia Prina. At the moment she perfects her voice under the guidance of Fernando Opa and Vivica Genaux. Amongst her many received awards are the first finalist’s prize of the Handel Singing Competition London and the first critic’s prize of the Festival Baroque Evenings of Varazdin in Croatia.
Her career in concert and opera led her debuting with many orchestras and ensembles dedicated to historically informed performance practice, such as Accademia Bizantina conducted by Ottavio Dantone, l’Ensemble barocco Limoges conducted by Christophe Coin, La Venexiana conducted by Claudio Cavina, Complesso barocco conducted by Alan Curtis, Les Talens Lyriques conducted by Christophe Rousset, l’Arte del Mondo conducted by Werner Ehrhardt, la Cappella Neapolitana conducted by Toni Florio, Le Musiche Nove conducted by Claudio Osele, Montis Regalis conducted by Alessandro De Marchi, Europa Galante conducted by Fabio Biondi (with whom she recently debuted at the Wiener Konzerthaus performing Handel’s Lucio Silla for the Festival Resonanzen).
She also participated at, amongst many others, the Styriarte Festival in Graz, the Haydn Festival Eisenstadt, the Schleswig-Holstein Festival in Hamburg, at the Handel Festival in Halle, and at the Rome Baroque Festival.
Francesca’s strong interest in Baroque theatre let her being engaged in the rediscovering of several operas almost forgotten in modern times: Among these she debuted in the leading roles of La Rosinda (in Potsdam, Bayreuth and Vantaa, conducted by Mike Fentross), Artemisia by Francesco Cavalli (at Hanover and Montpellier, conducted by Claudio Cavina) – both recorded and published by Ludi Musici and Glossa – and, side by side with Vivica Genaux, as Zelemina in Cavalli’s Veremonda at the US festival Spoleto Charleston (USA) in 2015.
Francesca’s successes include her debut at the Innsbruck Festival (Juno in La Callisto by Cavalli), and in Achille in Sciro by Sarro at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples during the theater’s anniversary celebration in autumn 2016. From 2012 until 2019 she sang succesfully under the musical direction of Michael Hofstetter the roles of Leonora in Verdi’s Oberto, Conte di San Bonifacio (recorded by OehmsClassics), Agrippina in Handel’s opera, Mirandolina in the same titled opera by Bohuslav Martinu, Vitellia in La Clemenza di Tito, Fiordiligi in Così fan tutte, Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni and the Contessa in Le Nozze di Figaro by W.A.Mozart, finally as Maddalena in La Resurrezione by Handel.
Of particular interest are her participation in the Opera Project Buthan, coordinated by Stefano Vizioli and Aaron Carpene, which led to the first staging of an opera in the Himalayan kingdom and a renewal in El Paso (USA) in 2014. Further international engagements led her to debuts in New Zealand (with Handel’s Messiah) and at the South Korean National Opera Seoul as Ersilia in Vivaldi’s Orlando Finto Pazzo.
A fruitful collaboration binds her with Mehmet Yesilcay and the Pera Ensemble, with whom she performes in prestigious concert halls all over Europe and recorded several cd’s for Glossa, OehmsClassics and Berlin Classics.
In the last season Francesca Lombardi Mazzulli debuted, amongst many others, in the role of Cleopatra in Handel’s Giulio Cesare in Egitto at theatre Bonn, conducted by Maestro Wolfgang Katschner, and as Falsirena in ‘La Festa di Venezia’ by Salieri under the musical direction of Werner Ehrhardt. She recently debuted with great success in the role of Rosane in La verita in cimento by Vivaldi at Schwetzingen produced by Opera Heidelberg, and at the Festival Drottningholm in the contemporary opera Suskinen i Mantua.
Future engagements will see her at the Innsbruck Festival, at Teatro Real Madrid, in Tokyo and Bukarest, and working together with conductors like Michael Hofstetter, Fabio Biondi and Ivor Bolton.
