Larissa Gergieva

Askonas Holt Ltd enjoys a very special relationship and a close collaboration with Larissa Gergieva, director of the Mariinsky Academy. Not only are we delighted to organise her schedule as accompanist to some of our most promising young artists, we also organise concerts on behalf of her Academy.

National Artist of Russia, Artistic Director of the Mariinsky Academy of Young Singers and of the Summer Academy at the Mikkeli International Music Festival, Larissa Gergieva was born in Beltsy, in Moldova. When she was seven, the family moved to Vladikavkas, in Ossetia where she began to study music along with her brother Valery Gergiev, chief conductor and artistic director of the Mariinsky Theatre, St Petersburg. Her pianistic gifts and musical insight are much in demand and she is in great demand throughout the world as a coach. She has visited San Francisco Opera on numerous occasions and in the summer of 1997 she coached the principals in the Salzburg Festival's production of Boris Godunov and La Scala's The Fiery Angel, Khovanshina and the Gambler, Eugene Onegin in Sapporo and Tokyo and The Enchantress at the Royal Opera House in London. She also gives masterclasses in France, United States, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Canada, Germany, Italy and Japan.

In 1998, Miss Gergieva was appointed artistic director of the newly formed Mariinsky Academy which was established to nurture young Russian talent, and from 1992 she has been the General Director of the international Rimski- Korsakov competition. She has been awarded a prize for best accompanist in more than 30 international and national competitions, among them Tchaikovski, Shaljapin, and the Elena Obratzova competition. She has also made 19 recordings; among them a Philips recording with Galina Gorchakova and Olga Borodina and an EMI CD with Daniil Shtoda. Her latest recording of lieder is with Ekaterina Semenchuk and is available on the Harmonia Mundi label.