PromFest, a festival for friends of opera, has been held since 2005.
The festival program concentrates mainly on young opera singers and audience members.
The jury is made up of world-renowned opera experts: singers, teachers, conductors, representatives of opera theatres and agencies. Barbara Hendricks, Edda Moser, Yevgenii Nesterenko, Karan Armstrong-Friedrich, Teresa Zylis-Gara, Ileana Cotrubas, Luana DeVol, Irina Arkhipova are those well-known singers who have been involved in the festival. |
The main attraction of PromFest is the yearly operatic production, in which the leading roles are performed by prizewinners from previous Klaudia Taev Competitions. Productions mounted so far include "Rigoletto" (2003, directed by Linnar Priimägi), "Demon" (2005, Mati Unt), "Carmen" (2007, Marko Matvere), "Thais" (2009, Mai Murdmaa), "Attila" (2011, Üllar Saaremäe), "The Tsar's Bride" (2013, Teet Kask) and "Aida" (2015, Madis Nurms). The last production, Giuseppe Verdi's "La Traviata", directed by Anu Lamp, was the co-production with Kaunas State Musical Theatre in 2017.
The new festival production will be "I Capuletti e i Montecchi" by V. Bellini with the last winner of the Klaudia Taev Competition 2017 Abigail Levis from United States of America in the role of Romeo.
In addition to the competition, the opera production and various concerts, PromFest will feature a workshop for singers at the Estonian Academy of Music. Also, video recordings of previous performances will be screened.
PromFest was created in order to broaden the creative opportunities for young opera singers, to bring high-level operatic artists to Estonia, and to help develop the image of Estonia within the world of opera and thereby expand cultural tourism and bring younger generations of Estonians closer to opera.
The festival is organised by NGO PromFest, whose main partner is the Endla Theatre in Pärnu.
The artistic director of PromFest is conductor Erki Pehk.