Aris Christofellis was born in Athens in 1960 and studied music (piano and singing) in Athens and Paris. He was the first countertenor of the modern era to revisit and give prominence to the soprano repertoire of the 18th-century castrati – until that time, countertenors had concentrated only on the alto repertoire. He gave his first concert performance at Mai Musical de Bordeaux in 1984, and has since appeared internationally in numerous concerts and operas (Théâtre du Châtelet Paris, Festival de Radio France et Montpellier, Alte Oper Frankfurt, Théâtre des Champs Elysées Paris, Theater an der Wien, Teatro Mercadante di Napoli, Teatro Arriaga Bilbao, Festival di Martina Franca, Festival Barocco del Teatro dell’Opera di Roma, Wiener Konzerthaus, the Odeon of Herodes Atticus, and elsewhere).
His repertoire ranges from Renaissance music to contemporary works, with a particular focus on Italian Baroque Opera of the eighteenth century. As a musicologist, he has brought many pieces of this period to light, and is a specialist on 18th and 19th-century vocal music ornamentation.
Christofellis has recorded for EMI Classics – L’âge d’or des castrats,Farinelli et son temps, Airs de virtuosité du XVIII siècle, Les castrats au temps de Mozart, From Distant Lands and Peoples. He also has made several other recordings: Vivaldi’s Ottone in villa (Bongiovanni) andL’Olimpiade (Nuova Era), songs of the twentieth century by Berg, Ives and Barber (Sirius), Songs to the Tree of Oblivion (Sirius, 2009), Music in Shakespeare’s Time (Musica Viva) and Carissimi oratorios (Musicaimmagine). He has also performed and recorded works written specially for him by Greek composers Yorgos Koumendakis, Nikos Kypourgos and Lena Platonos (Sirius, Lyra).
A Bononcini aria performed by Christofellis was recently included in The Record of Singing Vol. 5 (1953-2007): From the LP to the Digital Era (EMI Classics, 2009). This series collects and documents landmark recordings in the history of opera, from 1899 to the present day.
In 2000 Christofellis gave his last live performance and returned to Greece to begin a five-year collaboration with the Greek National Opera. He was assigned the artistic direction of Haendel’s Serse and Alcina, Vivaldi’s Orlando furioso and Mozart’s La finta giardiniera, teaching the works to a new generation of young Greek singers. These productions enjoyed great success, and signalled the beginning of a Baroque opera tradition in Greece. It was at this time that he also began to collaborate with the Orchestra of Colours on a regular basis, preparing and teaching thematic concerts of vocal music, and working always with young singers.
He regularly gives master classes at the Athenaeum Conservatory, the Athens Conservatory, the New Conservatory of Thessaloniki, the Municipal Conservatory of Kavala and the “N. Mantzaros” Conservatory, as well as at the annual “Suoni e luoghi del Barocco” Summer Academy in Sicily.
The year 2007 saw Christofellis collaborate with the Hellenic Festival to oversee, prepare and teach two concerts – given at the Odeon of Herodes Atticus and the Little Theatre of Ancient Epidaurus –dedicated to the Greek years (1937-45) of Maria Callas’ career, as part of the “Maria Callas – Thirty Years On” tribute.
In May 2009 he was appointed Head of Studies of the Athens Opera Studio, a branch of the Greek National Opera, where he taught for two seasons. He is on the faculty of the OperaVerona master classes and in 2014 he taught at the Teatro “Carlo Felice” Opera Studio (EOS) in Genova.
ARTEMIS BOGRI -vocal 17-22 July Idee Fixe ensemble
She was born in Athens and her first musical studies were piano. She had began classical singing training in the supervision of Marina Krilovici, at the Athenaeum Conservatory, from where she graduated with a unanimous full mark degree, 1st Award and a golden metal. She has attended singing seminars by Daphne Evangelatos, Jeanette Pilou and Aris Christofellis, with whom she continues to her studies in singing performance. She has been an active member of the Athens Opera Studio (Greek National Opera) from 2009 to 2011. She has performed with the Athens Chamber Orchestra, Athens Municipality Orchestra, Thessaloniki Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra of Colours, Greek Contemporary Music Ensemble and Camerata Orchestra of Athens under the baton of the conductor Helmuth Reeling. She often collaborates with composer George Couroupos, performing his works both in Greece and abroad. She has performed multiple times in productions of the Greek National Opera. Her roles include: Komponist in Richard Strauss’ “Ariadne auf Naxos”, Rosina in Rossini’s “Il barbiere di Siviglia”, Angelina in Rossini’s “Cenerentola”, Adalgisa in Bellini’s “Norma” and Bubikopf-das Mädchen in V.Ullmann’s “Der Kaiser von Atlantis”. She participated in the first nationwide production of the opera “The stage of miracles” by Greek composer George Couroupos and at the first worldwide revival of C.W. Gluck’s “Il trionfo di Clelia”, produced by the Royal Opera House in June 2012. She recently collaborated with the Ergon Ensemble and the conductor Kasper de Roo for the tribute to the pioneering British composer Peter Maxwell Davis, performing as Miss Donnithorne in “Miss Donnithorne’s maggot”. She received her B.S. degree in economics from the University of Piraeus.
VITTORIA LICARI - Vocal 12-21 July International Coordinator at the Conservatorio of Brescia(IT)
Graduated in piano, harpsichord and singing, she studied musicology at the School of Paleography and Musical Philology of Cremona. She is going to earn her master’s degree in History and Criticism of Cultures and Musical Goods at the DAMS of Turin.
She got the specialisation in chamber vocal music at the Conservatory of Milan under the guidance of tenor Petre Munteanu.
She followed in-depth study courses on the executive praxis of Medieval, Renaissance and Baroque music with Andrea von Ramm, Barbara Thornton, Benjamin Bagby, Piero Cavalli, Evelyn Tubb, Sergio Vartolo, Luigi Ferdinando Tagliavini; on the executive technique and praxis of Italian opera with Maria Luisa Cioni, Eugenia Ratti and Virginia Zeani; on classic Indian singing (Dhrupad) with Amelia Cuni.Co-founder of Ensemble Adelchis, specialised in the performance of Medieval music, in 1984 and joiner of the same group until 1989. Soloist of the New Polyphonic Ambrosiana Choir of Milan for many years. She carried on an intensive concert activity for prestigious institutions such as the Cini Foundation of Venice, the Musical Union of Turin, the Tudertina Academy, the San Giulio d'Orta September Music, the Borromeo College of Pavia, the Foundation of the Italian Centre for Medieval Studies in Spoleto, the International Association for the Study of Gregorian Chant and others. She is interested in the history of gestural character and she constantly gets up-to-date with vocal didactics and bodily problems.She obtained the diploma of École Internationale Serge Wilfart for the teaching of the method “Pneumaphonie – Analyser, construire, harmoniser par la voix” and she is deepening vocal didactics with Yva Barthélémy. She is very active in essay writing and journalism as well. She regularly contributes to Corriere del Teatro, a specialised magazine in the field of music theatre, and to web site eu-phonia.eu..She teached Opera Stage Art at the Music Conservatory of Mantua since 1993 - after one year at the Conservatory of Matera - until 2008. In parallel with the teaching activity she was Enzo Dara’s assistant for the 17th Century Music Theatre Workshop that since 2000 has been occurring in Mantua every two years. Since 2008 she’s Singing and Opera Stage Art Professor at the Music Conservatory of Brescia.She’s also essayist and journalist.
CHARIKLEIA GLAVOPOULOU -Vocal 18-22 July proffesor at the Municipal Conservatory of Drama(GR)
Soprano Charikleia Glavopoulou was born in Drama, Greece. She studied at the New Conservatory of Thessaloniki under Varvara Tsampali and graduated with a First Class Solo Diploma. She has attended masterclasses and lessons with Costas Pashalis, Nikos Zahariou, Eleni Karouso, Gabriella Ravazzi, Gabriele Pisani, Sergio Magli, F.M. Carminatti, Czaba Vegvary, George Hadjinikos, Daphne Evaggelatou, Mirella Freni and Cheryl Studer.
She went on to study at postgraduate level in Genova, Italy, with Gabriella Ravazzi and later in Athens with Varvara Gavakou.
Her Italian debut was in the lead role of Silvia in Mascagni’s Zanetto at the Teatro Mancinelli in Orvieto. In Italy, she gave vocal recitals in many cities and also toured with Gruppo Caronte. She also performed themed recitals with works by Greek composers at Teatro Carlo Felice Auditorium in Genova and at the Fiera Internazionale Di Milano.
In Greece she has collaborated with the Thessaloniki Municipal and State Orchestras, Thessaloniki Concert Hall, Thessaloniki Opera and other cultural institutions interpreting roles in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, Mozart’s Requiem, Menotti’s O Pulchritudo, Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi, Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel, Verdi’s La Traviata and Rigoletto. She has sung under the direction of distinguished maestros such as Loukas Karytinos, Nikos Athinaios, Dimitris Agrafiotis, Viron Fydetzis, Alkis Baltas and Luciano Di Martino.
Mrs Glavopoulou has performed in many music festivals around Greece as well as in solo and chamber music recitals. She performed Respighi’s Il Tramonto with the Aimilios Riadis Quartet at the Dimitria festival; she has also premiered works by Nicolaou with the Macedonian Saxophone Quartet at the Greek Composers Forum as part of the Dimitria festival. She interpreted the lead role of Margarita in the music-theatre show The story of Margarita…by Faust performing works by Schubert, Gounod, Verdi, Boito, Berlioz at the Centre for Drama Research. In 2013 she appeared at the Rhodes and Milos festivals and recently made a guest appearance at an Opera Gala homage to Verdi at the Tellogleio Cultural Centre.
She has been active as a singing teacher since 2000 and has worked at the New Conservatory of Thessaloniki, Music College, National Conservatory and the Municipal Conservatories of Lamia, Drama and Kavala. Since 2012 she has been teaching at the Summer Academy organized by the Municipal Conservatories Network.
Her students have excelled in competitions and have participated by means of audition in masterclasses organized by the Thessaloniki and Athens Megaron as well as other institutions. They have collaborated as soloists with the Thessaloniki State and Municipal orchestras and have performed at the Thessaloniki Megaron amongst distinguished singers under conductors such as Nikos Athinaios, Carolos Trikolidis, Miltos Logiadis and Andreas Tselikas. They have performed at the Centre for Music, the Municipal Theatres of Mitilini, Corfou, Lefkada, the Vafopoulos Cultural Centre of Thessaloniki and the Veria Megaron. In December 2012 her students performed three lead roles at Leoncavallo’s I Pagliacci at Aneton Municipal Theatre of Thessaloniki.Mrs Glavopoulou is also a graduate of the Law School of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki