RONGNA SU

Mezzo-soprano Rongna Su, from Inner Mongolia, made her debut at the age of 22 as Dorabella in Così fan tutte at the Shanghai Opera House. She holds an opera master’s degree from the Franz Liszt University of Music in Weimar, where she performed roles like Charlotte, Cherubino, and Annio. She is currently pursuing a second master’s degree in Lied and Oratorio at the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna, where she studies with Prof. Claudia Visca. She has participated in masterclasses with Thomas Hampson, Christa Ludwig, and Robert Holl. In 2025, she performed as The Drummer in The Emperor of Atlantis and The Witch in Hansel and Gretel in Vienna. Her numerous awards include first prizes at the International Lav Mirski and Bruna Spiler Singing Competition (2023), the International Josef Simandy and Tiroler Klassik Singer Award (2024), and the Franz Schubert International Singing Competition (2025). In 2023, she won second prize at the International Franz Schubert Singing Competition.

The first round of Rongna Su combines French romanticism and Italian verismo. In her aria “O ma lyre immortelle,” Gounod entrusts the Greek poetess Sappho with the task of expressing the torment of her unrequited love for Phaon, culminating in a tragic farewell to life. Next, Santuzza, in “Voi lo sapete o mamma,” reveals her painful story of betrayal and jealousy to Turiddu’s mother. The semifinal is divided between the late-romanticism of Wagner and the verismo of Cilea. “Höre mit Sinn” is the desperate plea of Waltraute, who in the first act of Götterdämmerung begs her sister Brünnhilde to return the ring of the Nibelungs to the Rhinemaidens to break the curse hanging over the gods. The final piece, an immersion in the pathos of Adriana Lecouvreur, sees the Princess of Bouillon express in “Acerba voluttà” her burning jealousy over the bond between Maurizio and Adriana.