Cristina Zavalloni

With a background in jazz training, at the age of eighteen she began studying bel canto and composition at the conservatory of her hometown. For many years she also devoted herself to classical and contemporary dance.

She has performed in major theatres, classical and contemporary concert seasons, and jazz festivals around the world, including: the Montreux Jazz Festival, North Sea Jazz Festival, Free Music Jazz Festival in Antwerp, Moers Music, Bimhuis in Amsterdam, London Jazz Festival, Klara Festival, International Jazz Festival of Rotterdam, Umbria Jazz, Blue Note in Milan, Casa del Jazz in Rome, Suoni delle Dolomiti, Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Concertgebouw in Bruges, Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall in New York, Walt Disney Hall, Teatro alla Scala in Milan, Palau de la Música in Barcelona, Barbican Centre in London, Beijing Concert Hall, Moscow International House, Vienna Konzerthaus, Grande Auditório – Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian in Lisbon, Banlieues Bleues, Les Nuits de Fourvière in Lyon, New Palace of Arts in Budapest, Auditorium Parco della Musica in Rome, Teatro La Fenice, Teatro Filarmonico in Verona, and Teatro Comunale in Bologna.

She has performed as a solo vocalist with orchestras such as the London Sinfonietta, Britten Sinfonia, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Asko|Schönberg, Ensemble Sentieri Selvaggi, MusikFabrik, Orchestra della RAI di Torino, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Orchestra della Toscana, Orchestra Toscanini, and Irish Chamber Orchestra, and has been conducted by Martyn Brabbins, Stefan Asbury, Reinbert de Leeuw, Iván Fischer, Oliver Knussen, David Robertson, Jurjen Hempel, Georges-Elie Octors, Andrea Molino, Marco Angius, among others.

She has collaborated extensively with the Dutch composer Louis Andriessen, who wrote many works for her, including Passeggiata in tram per l’America e ritorno, La Passione (2002), Inanna (2003), Letter from Cathy (2003), Racconto dall’Inferno (2004), the role of Dante in the opera La Commedia (2008), the monodrama Anaïs Nin (2010), and the role of Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz in the opera Theatre of the World (2016).

She is the interpreter of world premieres by Carlo Boccadoro, Luca Mosca, Emanuele Casale, Mauro Montalbetti, Michael Nyman, and several works by James MacMillan (including the US premiere of Raising Sparks at Carnegie Hall in 2011). Among the pieces she most frequently performs are Luciano Berio’s Folk Songs (performed in Amsterdam, Avignon, Budapest, Seville, Rotterdam, Innsbruck, Bochum, and throughout Italy) and Arnold Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire.

She also performs Baroque repertoire (L’Incoronazione di Poppea with Rinaldo Alessandrini in Strasbourg, Il Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda at the Baths of Caracalla), collaborating with directors and choreographers such as Mario Martone and Alain Platel (VSPRS and Pitié!, on music by Fabrizio Cassol), and with the Brass Bang! ensemble (Paolo Fresu, Gianluca Petrella, Marcus Rojas, Steven Bernstein) in the project Barocco!.

Her jazz collaborations include duo performances with Jason Moran, Benoît Delbecq, Hamilton de Holanda, Stefano Bollani, and Alfonso Santimone.

In 2012 she was guest at the Django Reinhardt Prize of the Académie du Jazz de France, and debuted at the Grande Auditório of the Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian in Lisbon with the Portuguese premiere of her jazz quartet IDEA and the program Per Caso Aznavour. She reprised Pierrot Lunaire at the Teatro Nazionale in Rome and Anaïs Nin by Andriessen at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles (US premiere). She performed at the Beijing Concert Hall with Andriessen’s Racconto dall’Inferno and took part in Fabrizio Cassol’s project Strange Fruit at the KVS and Théâtre National in Brussels. She returned to the West Cork Chamber Music Festival with Benjamin Britten’s Phaedra and revived Monteverdi/Battistelli’s Il Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda directed by Mario Martone at the Baths of Caracalla in Rome. She debuted at the Vienna Konzerthaus for the 100th anniversary of Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunairewith Uri Caine’s Moonsongs. She closed the year with a concert at the Perm Philharmonic and the Moscow International House with I Virtuosi Italiani, and performed in Bangkok with Federico Mondelci and the Bangkok Symphony Orchestra.

She opened 2013 with a singing masterclass in Cartagena (Colombia) at the Festival Internacional de Música, and the revival of Uri Caine’s Moonsongs at the Teatro Comunale in Modena. She debuted in Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia(Ravenna, Reggio Emilia, and Maggio Musicale Fiorentino) and as Miss Jessel in The Turn of the Screw (Bologna), within the centenary celebrations of Britten’s birth. She toured her album La donna di cristallo with the Radar Band, performing at the Roccella Jonica Festival, Turin Book Fair, Lugo Opera Festival, Turin Jazz Festival (with great success before an audience of 10,000), and Desenzano Jazz Festival. The project was later expanded in a “Deluxe” version with Cristiano Arcelli, the Italian Jazz Orchestra, and the Bruno Maderna Orchestra Strings at the Teatro Fabbri in Forlì. The Radar Band expanded from a nonet to a sextet, opening the season of Milan’s Atelier Musicale and the new Unipol Auditorium in Bologna for the UNESCO Cities of Culture meeting. In June she performed as Carmen in Bizet’s Carmenat the Les Nuits de Fourvière Festival in Lyon in the reinterpretation by the Orchestra di Piazza Vittorio. In December she recorded in New York with Uri Caine and an all-American band the album The Soul Factor (JandoMusic). In 2013 she also began working with television, creating and curating with journalist Moreno Cerquetelli the program Effemeridi Musicali (RaiTre), short television features in which she presents and interprets some of her musical projects.

In 2014 she returned to the Cartagena Festival Internacional de Música, giving both singing masterclasses and concerts in duo with pianist Andrea Rebaudengo and with the Assad Brothers, the renowned Brazilian guitarists. She continued with performances of Berio’s Folk Songs with Sentieri Selvaggi at the Sala Verdi in Milan for the Società del Quartetto, and again in Rome for the Accademia di Santa Cecilia. She also performed with Andrea Rebaudengo at the Accademia Chigiana and with I Virtuosi Italiani at the Zorlu Center in Istanbul in a Beatles programme. In summer she revived Carmen with the Orchestra di Piazza Vittorio at the Rome Opera’s Baths of Caracalla. She formed the quartet Special Dish with members of the Radar Band, whose self-titled CD was released in November 2014 as a supplement to Musica Jazz magazine.

In 2015 she debuted in de Falla’s El amor brujo with the Dutch ensemble Ludwig (Amsterdam, Utrecht). She performed at the Cologne Philharmonie singing Andriessen’s La Passione and at Warsaw Castle with Andrea Rebaudengo. During the summer she began a collaboration with Rebaudengo and German violist Danusha Waskiewicz, performing Brahms’ Zwei Gesänge Op. 91 at the Musica sull’Acqua Festival in Colico. She formed a voice-and-sax duo with Cristiano Arcelli, presented in the Grotta del Bue Marino for the Cala Gonone Jazz Festival. On the centenary of the Armenian Genocide, she created the project Pour toi Arménie—a tribute to Charles Aznavour—with the Apulian ensemble Ensemble ’05, presented in Monopoli, Bari, and L’Aquila. In autumn she premiered Mauro Montalbetti and Marco Baliani’s final opera Corpi eretici – Dramma musicale pasoliniano in 9 canti.

In March 2016 the CD Cristina Zavalloni Special Dish was reissued by the new label Encore Jazz. The quartet performed widely in festivals and clubs: Milan, Bologna, Elba Island, L’Aquila, Amsterdam, Rome, Rimini, Lake Garda, etc. She revived Francis Poulenc’s La voix humaine (premiered in Bologna and Bolzano in 2010) at the Teatro Argentina in Rome for the Accademia Filarmonica season. She devoted several months to creating the role of Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz in Andriessen’s new opera Theatre of the World, inspired by Athanasius Kircher (Los Angeles and Amsterdam). In summer she taught at the Siena Jazz summer masterclasses, and in autumn premiered Luca Mosca’s American Songs (for voice and ensemble, written for her) at Bologna Festival, later reprising it at the Fondazione Vedova in Venice.

In 2017 she took part in a production dedicated to Salvatore Sciarrino with the Orchestra di Padova e del Veneto conducted by Marco Angius, in the presence of the composer. This included concerts and a recording of Canzoni del XX secolo (Altri Volti and Nuovi 2, Decca 2017). In autumn she participated in the premiere of Mauro Montalbetti’s new opera Haye – le parole, la notte in Reggio Emilia, directed by Alina Marazzi with a libretto by Alessandro Leogrande.

In 2018 she began a collaboration with the JAS group, formed within the Orchestra da Camera di Mantova. In April she appeared at LAC Lugano in Serata Colorata, dedicated to music composed in the Ferramonti concentration camp. In May she performed in Spain at the Musica en Segura Festival, both in duo with Rebaudengo and with Holland Baroque. In June she performed Berio’s Folk Songs with the Bochum Symphony Orchestra conducted by Enrico Onofri. In September she took part in the Stresa Festival in the Italian premiere of Bernstein’s Peter Pan, conducted by Gianandrea Noseda. In autumn she performed with pianist Fabrizio Puglisi in O Supersong, produced by the Reggio Emilia Festival Aperto and later presented at Romaeuropa Festival. She also presented her album Special Moon at the Teatro Comunale in Bologna, featuring Norwegian electronic musician Jan Bang, beginning a fruitful collaboration.

In 2019 she took part in Libero è il mio canto, performed at the Sala Sinopoli of the Auditorium in Rome for Holocaust Remembrance Day with musician and researcher Francesco Lotoro, also performing with him at the Quirinale in a live broadcast in the presence of President Mattarella. In February she debuted at Unione Musicale in Turin with her ClaraEnsemble and a French programme. In March she premiered a new project with Tetraktis Percussion, including Ligeti’s Síppal, dobbal, nádihegedűvel alongside Cage. In April she gave the Italian premiere of John Adams’ Le livre de Baudelaire with the Orchestra Toscanini conducted by Marco Angius. In May she toured the Netherlands for Louis Andriessen’s 80th birthday celebrations, and in June she was in the United States at the Rockport Chamber Music Festival. On 20 July, marking the 50th anniversary of the Moon landing, she performed in Piazza Maggiore in her hometown in a trilogy of moon-related pieces from her album Special Moon.

Since 2017, Cristina Zavalloni has been regularly active as a teacher. She works at the Saint Louis College of Music in Rome, where she teaches improvisation and jazz singing. She has also led workshops such as Liberare la voce at Teatro San Leonardo in Bologna, masterclasses at the Cartagena Festival Internacional de Música, the Livorno Music Festival, Monash University in Prato, and the Conservatorio Rossini in Pesaro, and has been a faculty member of the international course ANFIBIA organized by Leggere Strutture (Bologna).

Her discography includes works under her own name and numerous collaborations. She has recorded for prestigious labels including Decca, Deutsche Grammophon, Nonesuch, Winter & Winter, Cantaloupe Music, and Blue Note. She was under contract for many years with Egea Records and currently records for Encore Jazz.