The soprano Sonya Yoncheva is one of the leading singers of her generation. With an extensive repertory that includes Baroque operas, as well as works by Cherubini, Bellini, Verdi, Puccini, Leoncavallo and Mascagni, she is a regular guest at the world’s leading opera houses. She is also much in demand on the concert platform.
In recent seasons she has made acclaimed appearances as Fedora, Norma and Elisabeth (Don Carlos) at the Metropolitan Opera, as Fedora and Maddalena (Andrea Chénier) at La Scala, Milan, as Cherubini’s Médée and Puccini’s Madama Butterfly and Tosca at the Berlin State Opera, as Imogene (Il pirata) and Stephana (Siberia) at the Teatro Real, Madrid, as Tosca and Madama Butterfly at the Bavarian and Vienna State Operas, as Violetta (La traviata) and Tosca at the Arena di Verona and as Tosca at the Zurich Opera House, in Yokohama and in Tokyo.
She has also enjoyed great success as Desdemona (Otello), Mimì (La bohème) and Gilda (Rigoletto) as well as in the title roles of Tosca, Iolanta and Luisa Miller at the Met, and as Iolanta, Elisabeth, Mimì and Lucia di Lammermoor at the Paris Opéra, Mimì, Norma, Marguerite (Faust) and Antonia (Les Contes d’Hoffmann) at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, Mimì and Imogene at La Scala, Milan, Desdemona at the Baden-Baden Festspielhaus and at the Philharmonie in Berlin and Tatyana (Eugene Onegin) at the Deutsche Oper Berlin.
Sonya Yoncheva is a graduate of the academy Le Jardin des Voix. Early music continues to be a focus of her repertory, including Phani and Zima (Les Indes galantes), as well as Dido (Dido and Aeneas) on tour with William Christie, with whom she also appeared to great acclaim as Poppea (L’incoronazione di Poppea) at the 2018 Salzburg Festival.
Born in Plovdiv in Bulgaria in 1981, she studied piano and singing in her hometown and in Geneva. In 2010 she won Plácido Domingo’s Operalia Competition and was also awarded the CulturArte Prize. In 2015 she received the ECHO Klassik as young artist of the year. In 2021 she received the OPUS Klassik as singer of the year.
Since 2023 she has also worked as a producer. She has released her most recent solo album The Courtesan and her book Fifteen Mirrors with her label SY11 Productions. With SY11 she has also organized a concert series in Sofia, featuring some of the most important singers of our time.
Sonya Yoncheva is an ambassador for UNICEF Bulgaria.
