BIOGRAPHY
Greek soprano Fanie Antonelou is the recipient of the First Prize in Oratorio/Lied at the international “Maria Callas” Vocal Competition in Athens. She was also awarded the Frankfurt Mendelssohn Prize and was a finalist in the Graz-based competition Schubert and Modern Music.
Her vocal repertoire spans from medieval and early Baroque music to contemporary works, supported by a soprano voice distinguished by its singular timbre and refined elegance.
Antonelou has performed roles such as Ines in Verdi’s Il Trovatore, Diana in Gluck’s Iphigénie en Tauride, Dienerin in Strauss’ Frau ohne Schatten, and the soprano part in a staged version of Bach’s St John Passion at the Stuttgart State Opera. She made her debut at the Perm State Opera in Russia as Susanna (Le nozze di Figaro), Zerlina (Don Giovanni), and Belinda (Dido and Aeneas). She sang the Maid in Zemlinsky’s Der Zwerg at the Megaron in Athens, Fairy in Purcell’s Fairy Queen at the Greek National Opera, and Ernestina in Rossini’s L’occasione fa il ladro at the Rossini Festival in Bad Wildbad. At the Attis Theater in Athens, she performed György Kurtág’s Kafka-Fragmente for soprano and violin in a production by the Zero Point Theater Company.
Other notable appearances include Monica (Menotti’s The Medium), Fairy (Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream), Ännchen (Der Freischütz), Giulia (La scala di seta), and Berenice (L’occasione fa il ladro) at the Wilhelma Theater in Stuttgart and the Reutlinger Philharmonie. Her repertoire also includes Sophie (Der Rosenkavalier), Nanetta (Falstaff), Gilda (Rigoletto), Euridice (Orphée aux enfers), Pamina (Die Zauberflöte), and Ilia (Idomeneo). She performed Arianna in Handel’s Opera Giustino with Lautten Compagney Berlin at the Wiesbaden May Festival and the Halle Handel Festival.
Fanie recorded the role of Susanna in Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro with MusicAeterna under Teodor Currentzis for Sony Classical. The recording was awarded the 2014 Echo Klassik for Opera Recording of the Year (17th/18th century). In collaboration with the ensemble Ex Silentio, she recorded works by the troubadours Raimbaut de Vaqueiras and Elias Cairel from the Latin Kingdom of Thessalonica, as well as pieces from the Codex Torino. Her first solo album, Affinities (BIS Records), features Greek and German art songs from the early 20th century. Her second solo album, Goethe Lieder (Coviello Classics), released in 2024, presents Goethe songs by Beethoven, Zelter, Reichardt, and Mozart, accompanied by Sofya Gandilyan on original fortepianos.
With Ensemble La Fenice and Jean Tubéry, she toured France with Monteverdi’s Vespro della beata Vergine and Natura amorosa - a program of 16th- and 17th-century vocal and instrumental pieces (Ligia Records).
She has sung the soprano solo in Fauré’s Requiem under the distinguished direction of Teodor Currentzis at the Autumn Festival in Baden-Baden, as well as on a tour in Russia. At the Hermitage Theater in St. Petersburg, she performed Britten’s Les Illuminations during the Musical Olympus Festival. With the Capital Symphony Orchestra, she sang at an Operetta Gala in tribute to Offenbach. In the past seasons, she sang Richard Strauss’s orchestral songs with the Stuttgart Paulus Orchestra, Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana with the Stuttgart Oratorio Choir, Handel cantatas at the Göttingen Handel Festival, and Dvořák’s Stabat Mater at the European Church Music Festival in Schwäbisch Gmünd.
Fanie Antonelou is maintaining a long-standing collaboration with Stiftskantor Kay Johannsen and the Solistenensemble Stimmkunst, performing Bach’s vocal works at the Stiftskirche Stuttgart between 2011 and 2021. From 2023 to 2026, the cantor and his ensemble are highlighting the vocal sacred music of Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy.
She has worked with ensembles such as the Munich Bach Choir and Orchestra, the C. P. E. Bach Choir Hamburg, Il Gusto Barocco, Barockwerk Hamburg, SWR Vokalensemble, Göttingen Baroque Orchestra, and the Athens State Orchestra. Her collaborations include conductors such as Cornelius Meister, Diego Fasolis, Antonino Fogliani, Hansjörg Albrecht, Johanna Soller, Jörg Halubek, Antonius Adamske, Wofgang Katschner, and Felix Bender, as well as stage directors including Ulrich Rasche, Philipp Himmelmann, and Valentina Carrasco.
Fanie stars in the short films Solastalgia - set to a poignant score by Claudio Monteverdi - and Exodion, which features a haunting composition for soprano and organ by Calliope Tsoupaki. Both films were created by video artist Lukas Rehm.
Her busy concert schedule has taken her to the Liederhalle Stuttgart (Haydn’s The Seasons), the Berlin Philharmonie (Handel’s Dixit Dominus), the Alte Oper Frankfurt (Mendelssohn’s Elias), the Vienna Konzerthaus & the Lucerne Festival (Barbarina in Le nozze di Figaro), the Hercules Hall in Munich (Mass in B minor & Messiah), the Schleswig-Holstein Festival (songs by Lili Boulanger), the Philharmonic Hall in St. Petersburg (Belinda in Dido and Aeneas), and the Novaya Opera in Moscow (Zerlina in Don Giovanni).
Born in Athens, Fanie Antonelou received her early musical training there, studying voice, piano, and music theory. She continued her vocal studies with Dunja Vejzovic and Ulrike Sonntag at the College of Music and Performing Arts Stuttgart and studied lied interpretation with Cornelis Witthoefft. She attended masterclasses with Theodoros Terzopoulos, Ileana Cotrubas, Paolo Montarsolo, Margreet Honig, Angelika Luz, and Sibylla Rubens. Her education was further enriched by advanced opera training at the Stuttgart Opera School and a postgraduate course in Early Music at the Trossingen College of Music in Trossingen with Jan van Elsacker.