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The Italian contralto, Margherita Maria Sala, began her musical education in early childhood under the guidance of her parents, both musicians. Besides early training in violin, she studied singing in the polyphonic vocal group “Famiglia Sala”, made up of the seven members of her own family. She studied choral conducting at the Accademia Biennale in Bellinzona with Marco Berrini, graduating in 2017. She was the 1st Prize winner of the 2020 Cesti International Singing Competition, where she also received the Audience Award and the Special Prize from the Resonanzen Festival at the Vienna Konzerthaus.
Margherita Maria Sala is an operatic contralto who has appeared internationally in concerts and opera, especially in Baroque operas. Riccardo Muti invited her to perform, with the Luigi Cherubini Youth Orchestra, Antonio Vivaldi's Magnificat in Lourdes and Loreto, as well as Giovanni Battista Pergolesi's Stabat Mater in Jesi and Ascoli Piceno. She celebrated her house debuts at the Oper Frankfurt as Lavinia in Steffani’s Amor vien dal destino under Václav Luks, and at La Fenice in the title role in A. Vivaldi's Ottone in villa under Diego Fasolis. She made her Théâtre des Champs-Elysées debut in 2021 in George Frideric Handel's Oreste alongside Franco Fagioli and under the baton of Maxim Emelyanychev, and has since returned to take on the roles of Bradamante in A. Vivaldi's Orlando furioso and Aristea in L’Olimpiade by the same composer, both under the baton of Jean-Christophe Spinosi.
Margherita Maria Sala is a regular guest at the Innsbrucker Festwochen der Alten Musik, where she has performed under the musical direction of Alessandro De Marchi in Pasquini’s Idalma, the Italian version of G.F. Handel's Messiah, and A. Vivaldi's L’Olimpiade, which she also presented at the Theater an der Wien, the Opéra de Nice and Moscow’s Tchaikovsky Concert Hall under Federico Maria Sardelli. She returned to Innsbruck for the Festival’s 2024 edition to star as Cornelia in Giacomelli’s Cesare in Egitto under Ottavio Dantone, and again in 2026 for the Festival’s 50th anniversary, taking part in the first modern performance of Pietro Antonio Cesti’s Il Pomo d’oro in a new production by Fabio Ceresa.
Other past highlights include Emilio de’ Cavalieri’s Rappresentatione di anima et di corpo in a Giovanni Antonini/Robert Carsen production at the Theater an der Wien, G.F. Handel's Rodelinda (Bertarido) at Theater Kiel and Monteverdi’s Il Ritorno di Ulisse in patria (Penelope) for the Festival Monteverdi in Cremona. Margherita Maria Sala made her debut with Akamus under the direction of Francesco Corti in the rarity Merope by Domenèch Terradella at the Staatsoper Berlin, Theater an der Wien, Teatro Real Madrid and Liceu Barcelona; she recently reunited with the ensemble in Berlin for the role of Marc’Antonio in Johann Adolf Hasse's Marc’Antonio e Cleopatra. She has further appeared in concert, singing G.F. Handel's Messiah in Versailles and Barcelona, La Resurrezione with Concerto Copenhagen at the Wiener Konzerthaus and Aci, Galatea e Polifemo at the Handel Festival in Halle. Add to this A. Vivaldi's Gloria and J.S. Bach's Magnificat in D major BWV 243 under the baton of Gianluca Capuano at the Festival Bach de Lausanne, as well as W.A. Mozart's Requiem under Václav Luks at the Rudolfinum in Prague and La Seine Musicale. She appeared in 2026 as Lavinia in Steffani's Amor vien dal destino at the Oper Frankfurt, directed by R.B. Schlather. a reviewer noted that her dark contralto voice gave the role an almost tenor sonority.
In the 2026-2027 season, Margherita Maria Sala will star in new productions of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas (Sorceress) at the Teatro Verdi di Pisa (Attilio Cremonesi/Francesco Bondì), Piccinni’s Zenobia (Radamisto) at the Teatro Petruzelli di Bari (Federico Maria Sardelli/Daniele Luchetti) and Magnard’s Guercœur (La Souffrance) at Oper Dortmund (Jordan de Souza/Olivier Py). On the concert platform, she will perform G.F. Handel's Aci, Galatea e Polifemo (Galatea) with Le Banquet Céleste at the Opéra de Rennes, Alcina (Bradamante) under Václav Luks at the Händelfestspiele in Halle, and Nicola Porpora’s Mitridate (Farnace) with Il Pomo d'Oro at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées, Teatro Real Madrid and Teatro Olimpico Vicenza.
Margherita will collaborate with Ottavio Dantone in W.A. Mozart's Requiem at the Teatro Alighieri in Ravenna and with Enrico Onofri in J.S. Bach's Weihnachts-Oratorium BWV 248 at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome. |
