Karina Gauvin’s outstanding performances have been recognized in prestigious competitions worldwide.
Her awards include the Virginia Parker Prize, and the Maggie Teyte Memorial Prize in London. Karina Gauvin was chosen “Soloist of the Year” by the International French Public Radio Community and in 2000 she was given an Opus Award as “Performer of the Year”.
Her repertoire ranges from the music of Johann Sebastian Bach to Luciano Berio and she has sung with many major orchestras including the Chicago Symphony, Philadelphia Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal, Toronto Symphony, as well as period instrument groups like Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, Musica Antiqua Köln, Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, Les Violons du Roy, and Accademia Bizantina. On the operatic or concert stage, she has performed with conductors as diverse as Charles Dutoit, Kent Nagano, Semyon Bichkov, Roger Norrington, Christopher Hogwood, Alan Curtis, Helmuth Rilling, Bernard Labadie and Christophe Rousset. Also active as a recitalist, she has collaborated with several chamber music ensembles and with pianists Marc-André Hamelin, Michael McMahon and Roger Vignoles.
She was also featured in the title role of Handel’s Opera Alcina with Les Talens Lyriques with conductor Christophe Rousset and the title role in Georg Conradi’s opera Ariadne for the Boston Early Music Festival.
A prolific recording artist with more than twenty releases to her credit, Karina Gauvin has been nominated consistently for the Juno Award, and twice for the Grammy, over the past decade. She won the Juno in 2001 and 2003 with Handel’s Silete Venti / Apollo e Daphne and Mozart’s Requiem with Les Violons du Roy, respectively. Her collection of French art songs with pianist Marc-André Hamelin, titled Fête galante,received the 2000 Opus award for Best Vocal Recording and was selected as Chamber Music America’s Recording of the Year. More recently, her characterization of Manlio in Vivaldi’s opera Tito Manlio on the Naïve label with the Accademia Bizantina and Ottavio Dantone was called “riveting” by Opera News.
She also completed several well-received recordings for Deutsche Grammophon of Handel’s operas Tolomeo, Alcina and Ezio with Alan Curtis and Complesso Barocco. In 2009 she was again nominated for a Grammy for her recording of Jean-Baptiste Lully’s Psyché . Her most recent solo album consists of arias from Nicola Porpora’s operas and was released in August 2009 on Atma, her sixth recording for that label, and following the recent “Handel Arias” and “Purcell” CDs. In spring 2011 will be released a recording of Ariodante with Alan Curtis and Complesso Barocco for Virgin Classics.
Among her last engagements, we cite: St John Passion with Chicago Symphony, Orphée et Euridice with Orchestre Symphonique de Québec, performances of Tolomeo and Giove in Argo by Handel were scheduled in 2010 as well as three recordings with Alan Curtis and Complesso Barocco. She also appears in Rinaldo with Accademia Bizantina in Paris and Cologne, with Andrea Marcon Juditha Triumphans at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam; Armida in Handel’s Rinaldo at Théâtre des Champs Elysées in Paris and Pamina in The Magic Flute at Montreal Opera House etc.
Future engagements include: Handel’s Ariodante with Alan Curtis for a European tour (London, Valencia, Madrid, Paris and Baden-Baden), Handel’s Messiah with the New-York Philharmonic, Malher’s Symphony n°2 with the San Francisco Symphonic orchestra, a French music recital at the Paris’s Opera Comique etc.