Polina Pasztircsak sings Strauss, Bartok, Shostakovitch & Kodaly
Vier letzte Lieder - 4 Last Songs AV150 (Richard Strauss)
Seven Romances on Poems of Aleksandr Blok (Shostakovich)
Eight Hungarian Folksongs (Bartok)
Two Hungarian Folksongs (Kodaly)
Polina Pasztircsak (soprano)
Danila Ivanov (cello), Philippe Villafranca (violin)
Alexandra Sasha Kozlov (piano)
Musikkollegium Winterthur / Alexander Rahbari, conductor
Recorded 06/2010
Born in Budapest to a Russian mother and a Hungarian father, Polina Pasztircsak began singing and playing the flute at an early age. She studied voice with Julia Bikfalvy while also studying at the West Hungarian University, from which she graduated with a degree in cultural management. Later she studied with Mirella Freni in Vignola and Modena and at the Conservatorio Frescobaldi in Ferrara, as well as taking advanced classes with Adrienne Csengery, Edda Moser and Evgenij Nesterenko.
In 2004, she won the Josef Szimandy Competition in Szeged, Hungary and was a semi-finalist in the 2007 Renata Tebaldi Competition in San Marino. Polina made her debut at the Modena Theatre in 2007 by performing in a new opera by Lorenza Ferrero.
In 2009 Polina Pasztircsak won the voice competition in Geneva, capturing the First Prize, and three special prizes: the audience prize, the Cercle du Grand Theatre [a lead role at the Geneva Opera] and the Coup de coeur Breguet [the recording of this CD].
She sang Micaela (Carmen) in 2009 in a production directed by Juraj Valcuha and then the same year she debuted in the role of Mimi in Budapest.
Montre Breguet and the Geneva Competition are proud to contribute to the revelation of young virtuosos who will undoubtedly leave their mark. Polina Pasztircsak moved all present with her talents at the 64th Geneva event and with that the financial support for this disc: a selection of pieces from three very different European traditions.
