Maria Bayo
Maria Bayo is a Spanish soprano who established her career in the 1990s and quickly made a transition from being a young light soprano to being (in her own words) a "lyric soprano with coloratura facility."
She has been singing and dancing for as long as she can remember. She had her first singing lessons with the nuns of the Cistercian abbey in the small town of Fitero, her birthplace. She sang in her church as part of a group with guitars and in a choral ensemble in Cintruenigo. She studied at the Pablo Sarasate Conservatoire of Pamplona with Edure Aguerri, then at the Hochschule für Musik in Detmold, Germany, where her teacher was Arthur Janzen.
She entered Spanish competitions in Logrono, the Julian Gayarre competition of Pamplona, and the Viñas Competition of Barcelona, and, in Italy, the Maria Callas Competition of Naples. In 1988, she won eleven prizes in the Belvedere Competition in Vienna, including the First Prize. In 1991, she won the First Prize in the Spanish Radio Classical Music Awards by unanimous vote of the judges.
She made her debut as a professional singer while in Germany, then sang The Pearl Fishers in Pisa, Italy, and La Sonnambula in St. Gallen. In the spring of 1990, she debuted in Madrid as Susanna in Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro to unanimous critical acclaim and wide public favor. She has also sung the role at Marsella, Montpellier, the Opéra-Bastille in Paris, and Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires.
Other of her early roles included Almirena in Handel's Rinaldo, which she sang in Lisbon, Madrid, and Reggio Emelia; and Micaëla in Bizet's Carmen at Monte Carlo, Madrid, and Bologna, and she frequently sings Zerlina in Don Giovanni, Antonio in The Tales of Hoffmann, and Lauretta in Gianni Schichi.
Spanish soprano Teresa Berganza is a mentor to Bayo; the two have sung on the same stage in Rinaldo and in Pergolesi's Stabat Mater at the Salle Pleyel in Paris. It was at Berganza's suggestion that Bayo made an unusual decision to sing Rosina in The Barber of Seville in the original lower key. Bayo has sung this part widely, including Marseilles, Montpellier, and Strasbourg. Also at Berganza's suggestion, Bayo made the unusual decision to sing the part of Fiordiligi (usually considered the lower role) rather than Despina in Così fan tutte.
She has also sung at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, La Scala in Milan, and La Monnaie in Brussels. At the last-named house, she received a rapturous reception for her performance in the title role of Cavalli's La Calisto, and returned there for a remarkable portrayal of Mélisande in Debussy's Pélleas et Mélisande with stage direction by Herbert Wernicke which took the unusual view that Mélisande, beginning in the usual passive manner, progressively becomes mad in the course of the opera.
On the concert stage, she has sung Mahler's Second Symphony in London under the direction of Giuseppe Sinopoli, and the Stabat Mater of Rossini at the Schwetzingen Festival, the Aix-en-Provence Festival, and the International Religious Week in Cuenca, Spain.
She sings Lieder recitals, but not with great frequency. (She is particularly fond of Richard Strauss' Four Last Songs.) She has a few contemporary works to her credit, but so far has mainly remained in the Baroque through Romantic eras. She is also highly regarded in Spain as a zarzuela singer. As of the end of the twentieth century, she began to branch out into German operatic repertoire, accepting engagements to sing Pamina in Die Zauberflöte and Sophie in Der Rosenkavalier.
© TiVo
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Cavalli: La Calisto
Maria Bayo, Marcello Lippi, Concerto Vocale, René Jacobs
Opera - Released by harmonia mundi on 26 Oct 2006
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Marie-Joseph Canteloube: Chants d'Auvergne et chants des Pays Basques
María Bayo, Víctor Pablo Pérez, Orquesta Sinfonica de Tenerife
Classical - Released by naïve classique on 1 Jan 1998
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Arias de ópera: Cancione
Opera - Released by naïve classique on 16 Apr 2007
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Viva La Zarzuela !
Classical - Released by naïve classique on 1 Jan 1996
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Airs d'opéras et Cantates
Vocal Music (Secular and Sacred) - Released by naïve classique on 3 Apr 2007
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Andalusian Nocturnes (Nocturnos de Andalucia) / Spanish Songs (Canciones espanolas)
Pepe Romero, Maria Bayo, Seville Royal Symphony Orchestra, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos
Classical - Released by Naxos on 3 Apr 2006
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bohemios
María Bayo, Luis Lima, Santiago Jerico
Opera - Released by naïve classique on 1 Jan 1994
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Mozart: Exsultate, Jubilate
Classical - Released by naïve classique on 5 Feb 1997
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Rossini: Opera arie e sinfonie
Maria Bayo, Rinaldo Alessandrini, Concerto Italiano
Opera - Released by naïve classique on 1 Jan 2001
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Canciones Españolas
Maria Bayo, Juan Antonio Alvarez-Parejo
Vocal Music (Secular and Sacred) - Released by Claves Records on 1 Jan 1992
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Turina: Vol. III. Selected Chamber Music
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Chamber Music - Released by Claves Records on 1 Jan 1993
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Tommaso Traetta : Antigona
Classical - Released by Decca Music Group Ltd. on 1 Jan 2000
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Arie Antiche
Vocal Music (Secular and Sacred) - Released by Claves Records on 1 Jan 1998
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Mi jardín solitario
Maria Bayo, Romeros, Los, Pepe Romero, Seville Royal Symphony Orchestra, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos
Vocal Music (Secular and Sacred) - Released by Naxos on 1 Jun 2009
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Boccherini, Soler, Nebra & Hita: Arias de zarzuela barroca
María Bayo, Les Talens Lyriques, Christophe Rousset
Classical - Released by naïve classique on 24 Mar 2014
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Cantos del alma - Sinfonía a Granada
Maria Bayo, Jose Luis Estelles, Luis Garcia Montero, Orquesta Ciudad De Granada, Vicente Coves, Jean-Jacques Kantorow
Classical - Released by Naxos on 29 Apr 2008
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Canciones Españolas
Maria Bayo, Orquesta Sinfonica de Navarra, Ernest Martínez Izquierdo
Classical - Released by Universal Music Spain S.L. on 1 Jan 2014
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Rossini: L'occasione fa il ladro, Early One-Act Operas, Vol. 3/5
Maria Bayo, Natale de Carolis, Iorio Zennaro
Opera - Released by Claves Records on 1 Jan 1992
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Antón García Abril: Variaciones
Real Filharmonia de Galicia, Maria Bayo, Antoni Ros Marbà
Classical - Released by Verso on 1 Dec 2013
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Rossini: Bianca E Falliero
Opera - Released by Dynamic on 1 Jan 2005
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Antón García Abril: Canción Española de Concierto (Volumen 3)
Classical - Released by Bolamar Ediciones Musicales SL on 5 Sep 2013
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo