ZORAN TODOROVICH AND FRIENDS

Gala Concert from the World’s Opera Stages

Marking 25 years of artistic work

Conductor: Alberto Veronesi (Italy)

Guests: Nikola Mijailovic, Evgenija Jeremic

The Orchestra of Opera & Theatre Madlenianum

Born in Belgrade, Zoran Todorovich has gain international recognition in the lirico-spinto repertoire and has appeared in such leading theatres as the Bavarian State Opera, Semperoper Dresden, Deutsche Oper and Staatsoper Berlin, Netherlands Opera, Theatre de la Monnaie in Brussels, Vienna State Opera, San Francisco Opera, Los Angeles Opera, Theatre du Capitole in Toulouse, Opera de Marseille, Royal Opera Covent Garden, as well as at the Bregenz Festival and at the National Theatre in Tokyo.
In 2009, Todorovich sang his first Wagnerian role, the title role in Lohengrin, to great acclaim at the Teatro Massimo di Palermo. Since then his repertoire includes most of the key roles for a dramatic tenor such as Andrea Chenier (Opera de Marseille – Opera de Geneve), Dick Johnson in La Fanciulla del West (Teatro Massimo di Palermo – Opera Monte-Carlo - Opernhaus Zürich conducted by Marco Armiliato), Jean in Massenet’s Herodiade (Flemish Opera in Ghent and Antwerp), Pollione in Norma (Bavarian State Opera in Munich with Edita Gruberova), Roberto Devereux (in concert in Warsaw with Edita Gruberova), Manrico in Il Trovatore (Opera de Geneve), Don Alvaro in La Forza del Destino (Opera Bastille in Paris - Gran Teatro del Liceo in Barcelona - Tokyo), Paolo il bello in Francesca da Rimini (Opera de Monte Carlo), Turridu in Cavalleria Rusticana and Canio in Pagliacci (Opernhaus Zürich – Deutsche Oper am Rhein - Moscow), Florestan in Fidelio (Liege), Guido Bardi in Una tragedia fiorentina (Teatro Regio di Torino and Opera Monte- Carlo conducted by Pinchas Steinberg), Don José in Carmen (Deutsche Oper am Rhein), Calaf in Turandot (Deutsche Oper am Rhein), Ruggero in La Rondine (Tel Aviv with Angela Gheorghiu), Le Roi Arthus (Opera Bastille conducted by Philippe Jordan).
In 2013, he added a new Wagnerian and a new Verdi roles to his repertoire, appearing as Radames in Aida in Marseille and as Parsifal for the Flemish Opera.
In the 2016/17 season, Todorovich made his successful stage debut as the title role in a new production of Otello at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein in Düsseldorf, where he later performed as Calaf in Turandot. He also sang as Giuseppe Hagenbach in La Wally at the Teatro Comunale di Modena, Teatro Municipale di Piacenza and Teatro Municipale di Reggio Emilia. Engagements in the season 2017/18 include Hagenbach in La Wally at the Teatro del Giglio in Lucca, Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein, Canio in Pagliacci in Leipzig, Calaf in Turandot with the National Opera in Bucharest and Cavaradossi in Tosca at the Opera Festival in Savonlinna. Future projects are the title role in Lohengrin and Eléazar in La Juive with the Flemish Opera, Canio in Pagliacci and Otello at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein and the debut as Apollo in Richard Strauss Daphne at the Hamburgische Staatsoper.

Nikola Mijailovic was born in Belgrade in 1973. After graduating of the piano department of music school “Dr. Vojislav Vučković” he started the study solo singing at the Faculty of Music in Belgrade in the class of his mother, Professor Radmila Smiljanić. Nikola continued his education at the Vienna Conservatory, where he debut in his 19 years as Count Almaviva in “The Marriage of Figaro” in class of KS. Valdemara Kmenta. After graduating in Vienna in 1993 he enrolled master studies at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, which he finished in 1996 in the class of Galina Vishnevskaya and Edward Zambara. During the study he was improving himself in the Music Academy in Santa Barbara, under the direction of Marilyn Horne. He was a member of the opera studio of the Paris National Opera- Bastille Opera House during 1996/1997. He encompasses his singer education in 1999 with diploma from the La Scala Academy witch train opera singers in class of Leyla Gencer and Luigi Alva.
Nikola Mijailović made his professional debut at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow as Schaunard in the opera La Boheme in 1996. That same year he performed as Marcelo next to Luciano Pavarotti in Philadelphia. Since then, he has made about 40 major baritone roles including Rigoletto, Iago, Eugene Onegin, Count Luna, Enrico, Escamillo, Valentin, Belk, Macbeth in leading theaters in Milan, Verona, Lime, Tel Aviv, Dresden, Hanover, Montreal, Havana, Oslo, Paris, Shanghai, Catania, Venice, etc … He had the honor to perform with artists such as Luciano Pavarotti, Jose Cura, Lucia Aliberti, Juan Diego Florez, Ruggero Raimondi, Denia Macola Gavaceni, as under the baton of Giuseppe Sinopolija, Riccardo Muti, Leopold Hager, Patrick Furnilijea, Nicholas Luizotija, Zoltan Sand and others. In addition to opera performances, Nikola Mijailovic has performed at the concert podium as well. He had performed Cantata Carmina Burana several times since the opening of the concert season Sava Center in Belgrade in 1998 and 1999 with Darinka Matic-Marovic, through Ravenna with the Kirov Theatre Orchestra from St. Petersburg, and Pavie with the choir Scala under the direction of Robert Gabijanija to Terme di Caracalla in Rome with the Choir and Orchestra of the Academy of Santa Cecilia. He performed the songs of young passenger of Gustav Mahler in Monte Carlo with the Belgrade Philharmonic under the direction of Aleksanda Markovic. He was a soloist in the Rachmaninoff’s „The Bells“ with orchestra Verdi under the baton of Mikhail Jurovski in Milan. He sung Puccini’s Mass Gloria in Lima, Rome and Belgrade, and he had a solo recital at La Scala with Robert Negri, in Belgrade with Natasa Veljkovic, Aleksandar Serdar and Ljubica Grujic, as well in Savona with Giovanni Reggioli and in Banja Luka with Ana Zoran Brajović.
He was the winner in the fifth international competition Luciano Pavarotti in Philadelphia in 1995. He won the first prize in the competition Mario Lanza in Philadelphia in 1994, as well as third prize in the competition Leyla Gencer in Istanbul in 1997. Nikola won the first prize in the last competition of pupils and music students of Yugoslavia in Herceg Novi in 1992. Since 2003, Nikola Mijailovic is a professor in the Department of solo singing at Faculty of Music in Belgrade. He was a member of the jury on the 38. Jeunesses Musicales Competition in Belgrade in 2008, as well as in Peter Konjović competition in 2014, and in the first international competition Lazar Jovanović in 2004 and 2014 in Belgrade.

Soprano Evgenija Jeremić was born in Kragujevac, in 1991. After receiving musical education at the „Dr Miloje Milojević“ Music School, she went on to study solo singing at the Belgrade Faculty of Music, where she finished her Master studies (dr.prof. Violeta Pancetovic-Radakovic as a professor). She has won many national and international competitions. These are most notably three first prizes:
- 2014 – „ 2nd Elena Nikolai International Competition for Young Opera Singers“ in Bulgaria - 1st prize;
- 2013 - „43rd International Jeunesses Musicales Competition“ in Serbia –1st prize;
- 2010 – „13th Nikola Cvejic International Competition“ in Serbia – 1stprize;
In 2011, she became a member of the Opera Studio „Borislav Popovic“ of the National Theatre in Belgrade, which was led by primadonna Radmila Bakocevic, and where she appeared and made her debut in the opera Suor Angelica. In the Belgrade Faculty of Music’s Opera Studio, with her mentor Dragana Radakovic, Evgenija sang the role of Stanka in Stanislav Binicki’s opera At Dawn in 2014. After these she also made her debut in the following roles: Micaela (G. Bizet - Carmen), Mimi (G. Puccini - La Boheme), Desdemona (G. Verdi - Otello), Violeta Vallery (G. Verdi - La Traviata), Rozalinde (J. Strauss- Die Fledermaus), Kostana ( P. Konjovic - Kostana)...
She has received awards from the „Danica Mastilović Fund“ and the „Biserka Cvejic Fund“, and in December 2015, the Belgrade Faculty of Music honoured her as the best student of her generation. In 2019, she received award from the Association of Musical Artists of Serbia (UMUS), for the most successful young artist in 2018. Evgenija has given many concerts and recitals in Serbia and abroad. Highlights in her concert reperotire, include her solo engagements in pieces by Poulenc (Gloria), Rutter (Magnificat), Beethoven (Ninth Symphony) with the RTS Symphony Orchestra and Choir in Belgrade (conductor: Bojan Sudjic), as well her performance of Mahler’s Fourth Symphony with Belgrade Philharmony (conductor: Daniel Raiskin), and concerts with Minsk Philharmony (conductor: Vjacheslav Bortnovsky), opera orchestra from Plovdiv (conductor: Luciano di Martino), Brasov opera orchestra (conductor: Traian Ichim), philharmony „Borislav Pascan“ (conductor: Djordje Pavlovic), etc.