The call from the Metropolitan Opera came one afternoon in early March.
Liudmyla Monastyrska, a Ukrainian soprano, was in Poland to buy concert dresses for a performance. Her phone rang, and it was Peter Gelb, the general manager of the Met, on the other end. He was blunt: his business was in limbo.
Ukraine had recently been invaded and the Met had parted ways with Russian soprano Anna Netrebko for her past support of Russia’s President Vladimir V. Putin. Gelb wanted Monastyrska, a charismatic singer known for her luscious sound, to replace Netrebko in a revival of Puccini’s “Turandot,” which kicks off Saturday.
Monastyrska, 46, was reluctant. In 2015, after a grueling run at the National Opera of Ukraine in Kiev, she vowed never to play the title role of “Turandot” again, worn out by his demands. And she was nervous because she would get caught up in the politics of the Russian invasion and alienate Netrebko, one of the greatest opera stars, whom she has known for seven years.
Gelb reassured Monastyrska and promised that her appearance would help draw attention to the plight of the Ukrainian people.
“I was surprised, but I thought it was important for me to sing,” Monastyrska said in an interview. “I wanted to help where I could.” However, she still felt uncomfortable. “I don’t like singing other people’s contracts,” she said.
Throughout her career, Monastyrska studied to avoid politics. She doesn’t have a Facebook page and doesn’t try to read the news. She prefers to focus on her family, her faith (she is Ukrainian Orthodox) and her artistry.
But in recent weeks, as the war in Ukraine intensified, she has found a political voice. She has criticized Netrebko’s tortuous statements about the invasion, saying Netrebko’s opposition to the war and attempts to distance himself from Putin have come too late. She has railed against the Russian government (“They kill people for no reason,” she said in the interview) and denounced artists who continue to support Moscow.
Her profile is likely to rise in the coming months. Next season, she will fill in for another artist who has come under fire for her ties to Putin, replacing Russian soprano Hibla Gerzmava in a Met revival of “Tosca,” the company said Thursday. (Gerzmava was criticized for signing a letter in support of Putin in 2014.)
And the Met announced this week that Monastyrska will take center stage when the Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra, a newly formed ensemble of Ukrainian musicians, tours Europe and the United States this summer. She sings ‘Abscheulicher’, an aria from Beethoven’s ‘Fidelio’ that touches on themes such as peace, injustice and humanity.
“She is a powerful, vocal symbol of the Ukrainian cause,” Gelb said in an interview, “and it will be manifested every night of the tour, as she sings Beethoven’s words against oppression and the call to freedom. The opening recitative of the aria she sings could be addressed directly to Putin.”
Gelb said he chose her for “Turandot” mainly because of her “very beautiful and incredibly powerful voice”.
“It’s a voice that can knock ‘Turandot’ out of the park in a house like the Met,” he added. “The fact that she is Ukrainian is an additional element of poetic justice that has certainly not gone unnoticed.”
Born in Kiev, Monastyrska was educated at Ukrainian conservatories and spent much of her early career in opera houses there. Her breakthrough on the world stage came in 2010, at the age of 35, when she was asked to sing, with just a week’s notice, the title role in Puccini’s “Tosca” at the Deutsche Oper in Berlin.
She made her Met debut in 2012, where she took the title role in Verdi’s “Aida.” In DailyExpertNews, critic Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim described her performance as a “triumphant house debut,” saying she had arrived at the Met as a “fully mature performer.”
“She is endowed with a luscious round soprano that retains its brilliance even in the softest notes,” wrote da Fonseca-Wollheim.
Monastyrska became known for her sensitive renditions of opera’s most famous characters, including Lady Macbeth, Manon Lescaut and Abigaille in Verdi’s “Nabucco”, which she sang at the Met in 2016. Her flourishing career landed her in the same job as Netrebko, who is four. years older. She described Netrebko as a “very warm person” and a “fantastic singer”; Monastyrska was once invited to Netrebko’s New York apartment for a Thanksgiving celebration.
Shortly before the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the two crossed paths in Naples, Italy, where they could be seen in the same production of “Aida” every other evening. During a rehearsal, Monastyrska said that Netrebko approached her and told her that she was against the idea of war between the two countries.
Later, Netrebko came under pressure to publicly denounce the war and Putin, whom she had supported in the past. She had supported his re-election and was photographed in 2014 with a flag used by Russian-backed separatists in Ukraine.
After condemning the war but not speaking of Putin, Netrebko saw her engagements in Europe and North America evaporate. She made a new statement last month to distance herself from Putin, saying she had only met him a few times and that she was “not affiliated with any leader of Russia”.
Monastyrska said the statement was insufficient. “She is number 1 in the opera world; she’s a very public person,” she said. “Why did she wait so long to say something? That is unbearable.”
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“She’s a normal person; she is not an animal, ”Monastyrska added. “But she should say, ‘I don’t support Putin.'”
Netrebko did not immediately respond to a request for comment through its representatives.
Monastyrska still has some hesitation in replacing Netrebko. “It’s not very good for me; I don’t feel good here,” she added, placing her hand on her heart. “This is not mine.”
Monastyrska said it is a complicated time for Russian and Ukrainian artists. She said she didn’t think it was appropriate for Ukrainian singers to appear in operas by Russian composers now, but she felt many of those works should be performed anyway.
She had mixed feelings about the attention paid to a video embracing Russian mezzo-soprano Ekaterina Gubanova after a recent performance of “Aida,” which was widely circulated online shortly after the invasion began and is seen as a symbol. of peace. She said she was happy to embrace Gubanova as a friend, but she also understood that some may find it inappropriate for Ukrainian singers to perform alongside Russians in wartime.
In the halls of the Met, while rehearsing for “Turandot,” she ran into Ukrainian bass-baritone Vladyslav Buialskyi, who was featured in a performance of the Ukrainian national anthem at a concert in support of Ukraine at the Met last month. She asked about the safety of his family and told him to be strong.
“She is a star everywhere, both here and at home,” Buialskyi said in an interview. “She is an incredible singer and an equally incredible person.”
Monastyrska has worked to overcome her hesitation with “Turandot,” her first Met engagement in five years. She practiced the intricate choreography of Franco Zeffirelli’s extravagant 1987 production, a crowd favorite.
Sometimes she had trouble concentrating, she said. Her parents, her son and her brother remain in Ukraine. “I think about them every minute and every second,” she said. During breaks at the Met, she sends messages to friends and family back home.
Right now “it’s almost impossible to sing,” she said. “But I’m praying all the time. I try to be strong.”
Anna Tsybko contributed reporting.
