Chiara Nicastro

Born in Ravenna, Valeria Montanari trained in dance from an early age. She was admitted to the American Musical and Dramatic Academy (AMDA) in New York, where she studied dance, singing, and acting, graduating with top marks.

She made her debut at the Teatro di San Carlo in Naples as a dancer in Micha van Hoecke’s ensemble in Carmen by Georges Bizet. She later performed in the cast of van Hoecke’s new creation for the Ravenna Festival, Pathos, la tragedia delle Troiane (Euripides and Seneca), alongside Mariella Lo Giudice and Lindsay Kemp, participating in the Sicilian tour. With Micha van Hoecke she also worked as both singer and dancer in Le Maître et la Ville and Chanteuse des rues. She was part of the chorus in Hindemith’s Sancta Susanna, conducted by Riccardo Muti with stage direction by Chiara Muti, and in Gustav Holst’s The Planets under the baton of Dennis Russell Davies.

Selected by Cristina Mazzavillani Muti and Catherine Pantigny among the “Danzactori” of the Ravenna Festival, from 2012 to 2019 she took part in numerous productions of the Trilogia d’Autunno and international tours. Between 2014 and 2016 she lived in Hamburg, where she founded the quartet Classic Kontrast, debuting in 2015 with Édith Piaf: Hymne à l’amour on the centenary of Piaf’s birth.

She worked as assistant director in Mimì è una Civetta, directed by Greg Ganakas and produced by the Ravenna Festival, later remounted for tour. In 2016 she founded the ensemble Anime Specchianti, with which she created the productions Nova Vita and Amor Ci Vinse for the “Giovani Artisti per Dante” festival, and in 2018 Partita Aperta, still on tour.

In 2019 she debuted as Anna in Verdi’s Nabucco at the Teatro Comunale di Ferrara. She later performed as Matelda in Quanto in femmina foco d’amor, featuring motets from the Codex Las Huelgas, with music direction by Antonio Greco and stage direction by Luca Micheletti during the 2021 Trilogia d’Autunno.

She graduated with honours in Renaissance and Baroque singing under Monica Piccinini and Roberta Invernizzi. In 2021 she appeared as La Ninfa in Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo with Ottavio Dantone and Accademia Bizantina, directed by Pier Luigi Pizzi.

She debuted as Drusilla in Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea under Antonio Greco, also directed by Pierluigi Pizzi, at the Monteverdi Festival in Cremona (2023) and later in Como, Pavia, Pisa, and Ravenna (2023/24 season). With Anime Specchianti, Valeria Montanari, and Rosita Ippolito, she premiered the concert-performance Barbara, Virtuosissima Cantatrice, dedicated to Barbara Strozzi, which she conceived and wrote, at the Teatro Comunale di Ferrara.

She was Maddalena in Nicola Porpora’s oratorio Il Trionfo della Divina Giustizia, conducted by Nicola Valentini with Ensemble Dolce Concento at the 2024 Ravenna Festival. In summer 2024 she assisted in the staging of Non dirmi che hai paura, based on Giuseppe Catozzella’s novel, directed by Laura Ruocco.

She later performed Fortuna in Il Ritorno di Ulisse in patria and First Witch in Didone ed Enea (Trilogia d’Autunno 2024) with Accademia Bizantina and Ottavio Dantone, directed by Pierluigi Pizzi. She also debuted in Francesco Cavalli’s Ercole Amante as Pasithea under Antonio Greco and Andrea Bernard at the Monteverdi Festival in Cremona.

In 2025, with Anime Specchianti, she created and performed Barbara, Virtuosissima Cantatrice, dedicated to Claudio Monteverdi and Barbara Strozzi, presented at the Monteverdi Festival in Cremona. She later debuted as Micaëla in La Tragédie de Carmen, Peter Brook’s adaptation of Bizet’s Carmen, at the State Philharmonic of Sibiu in Romania and the Teatro Goldoni in Livorno.

She is currently studying with William Matteuzzi.