BIO
American soprano Donata Cucinotta has been recognized for her versatile and powerful performances on opera, musical, and concert stages. Recent career highlights include performances with Michael Tilson Thomas and the Louisville Orchestra, a Lincoln Center debut with the Queens Symphony Orchestra, and multiple performances with Jack Everly and the Indianapolis Pops where Tom Alvarez of the Indy Star noted her “jaw-dropping solo during ‘O Holy Night.’ [Her] performance was one of the most breathtaking I have seen on any stage anywhere, anytime.”
Recent engagments include a return to the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra as a Featured Soloist in their From Vienna to Broadway concert and Yuletide Celebration. Donata also appeared last season as Candice in the world premiere of Stay, by John Glover and Kelley Rourke with On Site Opera. This season she looks forward to Countess Almaviva in Le Nozze Di Figaro with Opera Ithaca, Josephine in HMS Pinafore with Knoxville Opera, returning to Indianapolis Opera as Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni and joining the Jackson Symphony Orchestra for Mahler’s 3rd Symphony. Ms. Cucinotta’s additional appearances include Musetta in La Bohème with Indianapolis Opera, Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni with Opera Ithaca, Countess in ¡Figaro! 90210 with Morningside Opera, Erste Dame in Die Zauberflöte at Opera Tampa, Die Fledermaus with Amarillo and Knoxville Opera, Nina in The Firefly with Ohio Light Opera, and Nedda in Pagliacci with Opera in the Heights, where D.L Groover of the Houston Press noted:
“Cucinotta’s fiery soprano opened up with a blistering top, square on, raising goose bumps in the best possible way.”
She recently made two company debuts - Asheville Lyric Opera debut as Aldonza in Man of La Mancha and Indianapolis Opera in Johnathan Dove’s Mansfield Park. Her recent engagements include concerts with Baltimore Concert Opera and First Coast Opera, the title role in Evangeline with the Longfellow Chorus, recorded her first Mimì in La bohème with Reclamation Opera, and jumped in for Rachel Peters’s Wild Beasts with Center for Contemporary Opera where Richard Sasanow of Broadway World noted:
“Donata Cucinotta was the center of it all as The Girl, with its rangy music. She captured all that was puerile and needy, and at the same time cruel and unthinking, in the dysfunctional worlds The Girl lives in and Imagines.”
A frequent concert and recitalist, she has sung several concerts with the Terre Haute Symphony Orchestra, and the Columbus Indiana Philharmonic as a Featured Soloist, where Henry Upper of The Republic praised her “...inner feeling for the text, where time and again she showed her heart and her soul through the words....She is a superb talent whom we know we will hear from more."
She has also been heard in the Mozart Mass in C, Bach’s Magnificat and the Dvorak Requiem with the Denver Choral Fest. With the Indianapolis Symphonic Choir she has sung the soprano solo in Vaughn Williams Dona Nobis Pacem. She has also sung the soprano solos Bach’s in Die Elenden Sollen Essen, Mendelssohn’s Elijah, Dave Brubeck’s To Hope and Handel’s Messiah. As a recitalist, she will be touring her #Metoo program in conjunction with Sing For Hope and has performed as a guest artist with On Site Opera.
After graduating from Mannes College of Music, Ms Cucinotta joined Shreveport Opera as a Young Artist where she understudied the roles of Violetta in La Traviata, and Susanna Le Nozze di Figaro on the main stage. As a member of Opera Colorado’s ensemble, she appeared as Berta in Il Barbiere di Siviglia, understudied the Four Heroines in Les Contes d’Hoffmann, and sang the roles of Masha in The Music Shop and Juliette in Roméo et Juliette. She was then invited to make her Opera Fort Collins debut as Gilda in Rigoletto. As a resident artist at Opera New Jersey, she understudied Hanna in The Merry Widow.
Ms. Cucinotta is a Metropolitan Opera National Council Regional Finalist, a Finalist for the American Prize in Art song, semi- finalist in the Art Song Preservation Society of New York Competition, semi-finalist in the American Prize art song competition, semi-finalist in the San Antonio Opera Competition, Audience Choice Award and Honorable Mention at the Shreveport Opera Singer of the Year Competition, and a finalist at the Classical Singer Competition.