Oscar de la Torre

Bulgaria Hall heard Carl Orff's Carmina Burana in October 2018 with Oscar de la Torre among the soloists and the Sofia Philharmonic playing — an evening that also brought Paul Badura-Skoda to the hall for Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 24. The tenor is Mexican and studied with Francisco Araiza, Peter Schreier and Montserrat Caballé, and from 2007 with Saverio Suarez-Ribaudo in Munich. He sang in the Latin American premiere of Vivaldi's Montezuma at the Viva Vivaldi International Festival in Mexico City in 2007, and has appeared at festivals in Italy, Germany, the United States and South America, with the Zagreb Philharmonic Orchestra and the Elyma Ensemble among his partners. He has held a scholarship from Mexico's national fund for culture and the arts. His Carmina Burana brought him the Lunas del Auditorio distinction for classical performance in 2009/2010, awarded by Mexico's culture ministry, and a further nomination in 2016 for Rossini's La Cenerentola, while the Carlo Morelli international vocal competition gave him its Opera de Bellas Artes prize. He took a master's degree at the Hugo Wolf International Academy in Stuttgart, and his stages have included the Theater an der Wien, the Great Hall of the Musikverein, the Haydnsaal at the Esterhazy Palace, the Arena di Verona and St Peter's Basilica. Opera magazine counted the recording of Auber's La muette de Portici in which he sings among the best discs of 2013.