A Russian Carmen that is going places

Aigul Akhmetshina is the most exciting new mezzo-soprano to hit the Opera stage in years. She is currently singing the title role of Carmen at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. This 29-year old Russian, who says she is not Russian and has applied for British citizenship, is going to be the next rock star of the Opera stage, renewing public interest in this most comprehensive art form and representation of the best elements of human culture. She is so good, she is Luciano Pavarotti good.

Aigul Akhmetshina

If you don’t like Opera (with complaints like “I can’t understand the language” or “it makes me fall asleep”) this post is not for you, so move on, go watch your Gutfeld. I don’t speak Italian or German, either, and know only a few words of Russian, and a few more of French. But in Opera, the words don’t matter as much as the sound, the music. The story is important, but more so the music. (If you know opera, and know good music matched to a bad story, think Puccini’s Manon Lescaut!) The music is created by a composer, and the sounds by an orchestra and the stage performers. The beauty depends on all three working, but the most important sounds come from the individual singer. And what Akhmetshina delivers is awesome.

We heard her last night at a private salon sponsored by Ann Ziff and the Metropolitan Opera, joined also by the very impressive young Minnesota born tenor Jack Swanson, at The Lotos Club on East 66th Street in New York City.

I won’t try to write a classic “review” of this special evening and what we saw last night, but I can tell you that Akhmetshina is the real deal and I can speak with a modicum of authority. Both of my parents were professional choristers with the San Francisco Opera Company in the 1940s, then considered second only to the Met in quality on the American continent. My mother, who was a Russian immigrant, even achieved soloist status, singing opposite the famous Alexander Kipnis in a stage version of the Russian language opera “Boris Gudenov” during the War.

In 1966, as a child, my choir Director dad and our parish priest took me to the imposing War Memorial Opera House on Van Ness Avenue to see and hear a young Luciano Pavarotti sing Rodolfo in La Boheme in one of his first ever performances in San Francisco. (The popular S.F. Chronicle columnist and humorist Herb Caen wrote at the time, that Pavarotti sang well and was unusual as an Opera singer in that “he looks like Leo Nomellini” a long time lineman for the 49ers.)

Leo Nomellini not Luciano Pavarotti

Pavarotti was amazing, powerful, avuncular to the role, and made a lasting impression, even on this little kid, who could not take his eyes or ears off of him, despite not fully understanding what the heck was happening in the opera!

Akhmetshina reminds me of a couple people. One of them is Pavarotti.

At the salon, Akhmetshina performed three numbers and ended with a rollicking duet with Swanson of the Neapolitan song “O Sole Mio.” Her centerpiece though was from Carmen, the song about the Inn of Lillias Pastia, and her strong, sultry, even husky, mezzo-soprano voice shook the room. Her vocalization is clear, lyrical power brilliant, and she brought this patron to tears. The second person she reminded me of came from the timber of her voice. It sounded like my mother’s singing voice.

You don’t need to know or love opera to appreciate what Aigul offers. If you enjoy beautiful music, try to hear Akhmetshina.

Here is her background on Wikipedia: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aigul_Akhmetshina

Here is her Habanera from Carmen, which is superb: https://youtu.be/DU9LHmGL8QA. (I hope the link works.)

And here is a picture of a happy me at Gabriel’s on Central Park South having a late night dinner with my wife after the salon!

Jim Lacy at Gabriel’s New York City, 5/19/25