Igor Golovatenko has quickly made a name for himself on both the concert platform and operatic stage since his debut in the 2006 Russian premiere of Delius’ Eine Messe des Lebens with the Russian National Philarmonic Orchestra, conducted by Vladimir Spivakov. Having studied at the Moscow Academy of the Choral Arts with Professor Dmitry Vdovin, Golovatenko was awarded First Prize at the St Petersburg Three Centuries of Classical Romance Competition and Second Prize at Dresden’s International Competizione dell’Opera.

A leading baritone at the Bolshoi Opera, Igor Golovatenko will return there this season as Andrei Tchelkalov in Boris Godunov, Lescaut in Manon Lescaut, Rodrigo in Don Carlos, and Robert in Iolanta. He has previously appeared at the Bolshoi as Germont in La Traviata, Posa in Don Carlos, and Marcello in La Boheme. In recent seasons, Golovatenko has made a number of significant debuts: Severo in Donizetti’s Poliuto at the Glyndebourne Festival, Sharpless in Madama Butterfly at the Teatro Colon in Buenos Aires, Guy de Montfort in Les Vêpres Siciliennes at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples, and di Luna in Il Trovatore at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich. This season, Golovatenko will also debut at the Salzburg Festival as Prince Yeletsky in Pique Dame, appear at the Opéra de Bordeaux as Ernesto in Il Pirata, and sing Mahler’s Symphony No. 8 at the BBC Wales’s Proms in the Park. Future engagements include his debut at the Metropolitan Opera

Other recent performances include Enrico in Lucia di Lammermoor at the Cologne Opera; his return to the Glyndebourne Festival as Germont in La Traviata; Rachmaninov’s Spring Cantata with the BBC Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican; Iokanaan in Mariotte’s Salome and Carlo Gustavo in Foroni’s Cristina regina di Svezia at the Wexford Festival; Renato in Un Ballo in maschera at the Teatro Sociale di Rovigo, Opera Giocosa di Savona and Teatro di Bergamo as part of the Bergamo Music Festival; the title role in Rigoletto with Opera Giocosa di Savona (directed by Rolando Panerai); Seid in Verdi’s Corsaro at the Teatro Verdi di Trieste (conducted and directed by Gianluigi Gelmetti); the title role in Eugene Onegin at the Teatro San Carlo di Napoli; Lopakhin in Fénelon’s La Cerisaie at the Opéra National de Paris; Shchelkalov and Rangoni in Boris Godunov at the Teatro Massimo Palermo (directed by Hugo de Ana); Monfort in Les Vêpres Siciliennes at the Teatro San Carlo di Napoli; Shchelkalov in Boris Godunov at the Bavarian State Opera (conducted by Kent Nagano and directed by Calixto Bieito); and Germont in La Traviata (directed by Francesca Zambello) and Posa in Don Carlos (directed by Adrian Noble) at the Bolshoi.