Lithuanian tenor Kristian Benedikt has built up a reputation as one
of the leading international singers of Verdi’s Otello.
He sang this most demanding role more than 120 times:
at Opera de Bellas Artes in Mexico, Teatro Filarmonico in Verona,
Wiener
Staatsoper, Bavarian State Opera Munich, at the
Mariinski Theatre in
St. Petersburg, Modena, Piacenza, Cagliari, Palermo, Ekaterinburg, Santiago
de Chile, Vilnius, Graz, Basel, Stockholm, Latvian Opera Festival and
at
In the nearest future he is going to record Corrado
part in A. Ponchielli’s I Lituani, to perform Wagner’s Parsifal and
to sing Radames (Aida) at Latvian National Opera in
2021 as well as Calaf (Turandot),
Canio
(Pagliacci), Samson,
Otello,
Manrico (Il trovatore)
in Lithuania, Italy, Australia, Korea and Gala concert in Peter Dvorsky
Festival in Chechia.
His past engagements include Don Alvaro
(La forza del destino) in Lisbon and Porto (Portugal),
Herman
at Vilnius City Opera and Metropolitan Opera. 2020 is market by a double
debut of Kristian in Erik (Der fliegende Holländer)
at Bilbao Opera with Bryn Terfel. In 2020, he sang
Calaf
at Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre, Mahler‘s Das Lied von
der Erde at Vilnius Festival (cond. M. Pitrėnas), Beethoven‘t the 9th
with Lithuanian State Symphony Orchestra (cond. G. Rinkevičius) and
Tenoriada concerts.
In 2018 Kristian made his debut at the Metropolitan Opera
in New York with the role of Samson (Samson et Dalila),
and in 2019 he debuted as Andrea Chenier at the
Trieste
Teatro Verdi and as Calaf at the
Teatre Colón along
with Maria Guleghina. He also sang
Calaf at Lithuanian
National Opera and Ballet Theatre (dir. R. Willson),
Samson
and Herman (with Asmik Grigorian) at Vilnius City Opera,
and a Gala concert in Pažaislis festival. Benedikt‘s first CD was released
in 2019 by DELOS.
During his latest seasons Benedikt sung at the Wiener Staatspoer
(Otello), London Royal Covent Garden Opera (Canio),
Mariinsky Theatre
(Otello, Samson,
Lohengrin), Teatro Municipal de Santiago Chile (Otello,
Calaf), Beijing NCPA (Samson),
Moscow Bolshoi Theatre (Herman),
Hungarian
National Opera (Otello,
Herman), Torino Regio (Samson),
Barcelona Liceo
(Rienzi), Bergamo Opera (Cavaradossi),
Dresden Semperoper (Otello),
Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet theatre (Alfredo, Corrado, Don
Jose, Pinkerton, Duca, Eleazar, Otello, Ernani, Siegmund,
Calaf), Finland
National Opera (Dick Johnson),
Odeon in Odense (Siegmund), Vilnius City
Opera (Des Grieux, Samson), Macedonian National Opera (Calaf), Savonlinna
Festival (Otello), Al Bustan Festival (Otello), Festival Opera pa Skaret
(Don Jose, Edgardo) etc.
He has performed under the baton of conductors such as Antonio Pappano,
Marco Armiliato, Marcello Votti, Riccardo Chailly, Maurizio Barbacini,
Paolo Carigniani, Asher Fisch, Renato Palumbo, Valeri Gergiev, Alexander
Vedernikov and is working with stage directors like
Giancarlo del Monaco, Damiano Michieletto, Willy Decker, David Alden,
Calixto Bieito, Hugo de Ana, Dmitri Bertman, Eimuntas Nekrošius and
Pier Francesco Maestrini.
As a concert singer he has sung among others in
Verdi’s Requiem, Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde, Rachmaninov’s The Bells
and Webber’s Requiem.
During 2008-2018 Benedikt has worked with famous Italian tenor Gianfranco
Cecchele, paying special attention to the Italian opera and taking over
vocal tradition of Mario del Monaco. He has also studied with Virgilijus
Noreika, Jaakko Ryhänen and Robert Lloyd.
