EmaNikolovska

/
  • Mezzo-Soprano

About Ema

Macedonian-Canadian mezzo-soprano Ema Nikolovska completed her Master's in Voice at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, where she also completed the Opera Course. She was a BBC New Generation Artist from 2019-2022 and in 2022 she became a recipient of the prestigious Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award.

She is an Alumna of the International Opera Studio at the Deutsche Staatsoper Berlin where in 2023 she made her role debut as Octavian Der Rosenkavalier. She returns in the 2024/25 season for Stefano in Romeo et Juliette. In the 2023/24 season she made her house and role debut as the Fox in Janáček's The Cunning Little Vixen at the Canadian Opera Company and her debut at the Royal Opera House's Linbury Theatre singing the lead role in George Benjamin's Picture a Day Like This, a role she will revive this season at the Opera du Rhin, Strasbourg.

In concert she will make her debut in Japan singing Mozart arias with the NHK Symphony and Petr Popelka. Other concerts this season include Debussy's La Damoiselle Elue with George Benjamin and the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France and Mozart's Davide Penitente at the Vicenza Festival conducted by Andras Schiff.

Already a celebrated recitalist, in the 2023/24 season her partners included Martha Argerich, Sir András Schiff, Charles Richard-Hamelin and Sean Shibe. She made her debut recital tour in the U.S. and Canada, including Carnegie Hall, and was a Featured Artist at Wigmore Hall. Her 2024/25 recitals include Paris, Berlin, Hamburg, Luxembourg, Amsterdam and a return to Wigmore Hall.

Ema is based in Berlin

Download programme biography   

Contact

Megan Steller

Megan Steller

Associate Artist Manager
Ivo Ivanov

Ivo Ivanov

Assistant Artist Manager

Representation

General management with Askonas Holt Partner Managers: Johanna Herbst Artist Management (concerts in Germany & Austria) Étude Arts (United States, Canada, Central & South America)

Follow Ema

Season Highlights

Sep 2024 - Oct 2024
Opera du Rhin, Strasbourg
Benjamin Picture a Day Like This (Woman) Alphonse Cemin (conductor)
Nov 2024 - Nov 2024
Deutsche Staatsoper Berlin
Gounod 'Romeo et Juliette' (Stephano) Stefano Montanari (conductor)
Jan 2025 - Jan 2025
Wigmore Hall, London
programme to include Rainier, Copland, Schubert, Prokofiev, Messiaen, Crumb Kunal Lahiry - piano
Feb 2025 - Feb 2025
Suntory Hall, Tokyo
Mozart arias Petr Popelka (conductor) NHK Symphony Orchestra
May 2025 - May 2025
Philharmonie, Paris
Debussy La Damoiselle Elue Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France George Benjamin(conductor)
May 2025 - May 2025
Vicenza Festival
Mozart Davide Penitente Andras Schiff (conductor)

Video

Photos

Download high resolution images

Selected Repertoire

Benjamin

Picture a Day Like This (Woman)

Berlioz

La damnation de Faust (Marguerite)*

Debussy

Pelléas et Mélisande (Mélisande)*

Gounod

Faust (Siebel)*   •   Roméo et Juliette (Stefano)*

Handel

Semele (Juno)*   •   Alcina (Ruggiero/Bradamante)*   •   Ariodante*

Henze

Cubana (Lucile)

Humperdinck

Hänsel und Gretel (Hänsel)

Janáček

The Cunning Little Vixen (Fox)

Massenet

Werther (Charlotte)*

Mozart

Così fan tutte (Dorabella)*   •   Idomeneo (Idamante)*   •   Le Nozze di Figaro (Cherubino)*   •   La Clemenza di Tito (Sesto)*

Purcell

Dido and Aeneas (Dido)*

Rameau

Hippolyte et Aricie (Hippolyte)

Ravel

Le Heure Espagnolle (Concepción)*

Strauss

Der Rosenkavalier (Octavian)   •   Ariadne auf Naxos (Komponist)*

Tchaikovsky

Pique Dame (Polina)*

Verdi

Rigoletto (Giovanna)

Vivaldi

Orlando*

Weber

Oberon (Fatima)*

News

Press

  • Ema Nikolovska in recital with Sir Andras Schiff

    Wigmore Hall
    Jun 2024

    • An artistic event of top quality to cherish ... Nikolovska performed all songs from memory, all in original language. She clearly fully understood and thus presented all emotions within the text/music with dramatic flair but, at the same time, with disciplined style of the period. There were some appropriate operatic gestures while dynamics as well as tone colours were plentiful and delivered with care ... Nikolovska is a great communicator within the performance but also off-performance. She talked to the audience from the stage with ease, flair, and plenty of humour.

  • Orlando: The Adventurer - Song and Guitar

    Bath Festival
    May 2024

    • this was all part of a remarkable concert by the mezzo Ema Nikolovska and the guitarist Sean Shibe at the Bath Festival — and if I say that the experience felt like being awake in a vivid dream, I do so as a compliment.

  • Vancouver Recital

    Vancouver Playhouse
    Mar 2024

    • Nikolovska’s voice is focused, rich, and velvety. Though she is at the beginning of her career, her sound is mature and her instinct for interpretation highly developed.

  • Janáček - The Cunnning Little Vixen (The Fox)

    Canadian Opera Company
    Jan 2024 - Feb 2024

    • When she falls for Fox, her spirited soprano combines with Nikolovska’s spacious mezzo to spin a cocoon of love that’s in a totally different world from that of the brutish humans.

    • Soprano Ema Nikolovska was a bright voiced, endearing Fox.

    • Ema Nikolovska, who rounds out the main company, is particularly wonderful as the Fox with whom Sharp Ears falls in love. Their perfectly delivered second-act love duet is among the highlights of the evening.

    • Ema Nikolovska is another standout as the Fox, with whom the Vixen falls madly in love. In what is technically a trouser role (a funny thought when foxes are concerned), Nikolovska shines with a clear, powerful mezzo that soars high with ease. This is a COC debut for her, and a total treat to hear.

    • Fox, a trousers-role sung with vitality and emotion by Ema Nikolovska. Nikolovska’s bright mezzo-soprano blends well with Archibald’s high soprano…. Archibald and Nikolovska display their fine acting skills

  • Benjamin - Picture a Day Like This (Woman)

    Linbury Theatre
    Sep 2023

    • As the Woman, mezzo-soprano Ema Nikolovska is both vulnerable and stoical, responding to this rollercoaster day with a voice of many colours.

    • Ema Nikolovska gave an outstanding performance as Woman, caressing Benjamin’s sinuous writing with an unbearable tenderness.

    • Ema Nikolovska sings with poise and impact throughout. Simply dressed in a frock and trench-coat, she is urgent but never over-emotional, only rising to fury in a central aria in which she expresses her disillusionment that her quest is futile and condemned to fail. Instead, she uses nuanced vocal colours and beautiful phrasing to delineate her changing moods.

  • Strauss - Der Rosenkavalier (Octavian)

    Berlin Staatsoper
    Apr 2023

    • Stichwrot Octavian: Wie ein furchtloser Ritter beherrscht Ema Nikolovska jugendlicher Graf den Abend fast schon im Alleingang. Mit seinen siebzehn Jaren ist er her rim Haus, und die Sangerin Herrscherin der Buhne. Keyword Octavian: Like a fearless knight, Ema Nikolovska, the youthful count, almost single-handedly dominates the evening. At seventeen he is the master of the house, and the singer ruler of the stage.

    • Y que bien estuvo Ema Nikolovska como el joven adolescente lleno de si mismo y lleno de vigor sexual. La voz corrio clara y audible por el escenario del Staatsoper Unter den Linden, sabiendo como indicar cambios de humor y en lod duetos con Sophie supo como manejar el registro agudo sin problemas. And how well was Ema Nikolovska as the young adolescent full of himself and full of sexual vigour. The voice ran clear and audible across the stage of the Staatsoper Unter den Linden, knowing how to indicate mood swings and in duets with Sophie he knew how to handle the high register with ease.

  • Rameau - Hippolyte et Aricie

    Philharmonie de Paris
    Nov 2021

    • Ema Nikolovska une Diane au riche médium qui détaille superbement la noble complexité de son personnage. Ema Nikolovska a Diana with a rich medium who superbly details the noble complexity of her character.

    • La Diane de Ema Nikolovska a toute l’assurance et l’aisance d’une déesse, ainsi que la surface vocale. Ema Nikolovska’s Diana has all the confidence and ease of a goddess, as well as the vocal surface.

    • Ema Nikolovska prête sa voix intense et vibrante au personnage de Diane. Personnage réconfortant, elle déclame le texte au plus près des intentions théâtrales et ses vocalises agiles s’envolent joyeusement pour annoncer la bonne nouvelle qu’Hippolyte n’est pas mort. Ema Nikolovska lends her intense and vibrant voice to the character of Diane. A comforting character, she declaims the text as closely as possible to the theatrical intentions and her agile vocalisations joyfully take flight to announce the good news that Hippolyte is not dead.

    • ma Nikolovska déploie dans le rôle de Diane son soprano lumineux et homogène. Elle est également une des seules ce soir à faire preuve d’une prononciation à l’intelligibilité appréciable. Ema Nikolovska displays her luminous and homogeneous soprano in the role of Diana. She is also one of the few tonight to demonstrate an appreciably intelligible pronunciation.

  • Ema Nikolovska & Malcolm Martineau BBC Proms

    Cadogan Hall
    Sep 2021

    • Nikolovska is the possessor of a beautiful, versatile and technically assured instrument with gorgeous colours to it ... She has a winning and communicative persona ... Nikolovska gave a contained yet dramatic reading that made one eager to see her on the dramatic stage.

  • Leeds Lieder Gala

    Wigmore Hall
    Jun 2019

    • ...her exceptional communication and dramatic skill...was a tour de force of quite terrifying skill.

Discography