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Masabane Cecilia Rangwanasha

Soprano

  • Rising star Masabane Cecilia Rangwanasha won the Song Prize at the 2021 BBC Cardiff Singer of the World Competition and recently was awarded the 2024 Herbert von Karajan Prize at the Salzburg Easter Festival.

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  • Highlights of the 2026/27 season include a house and role debut as the title role in Puccini’s Tosca with Detroit Opera as well as a house debut with Boston Lyric Opera, where she reprises the role of Contessa d’Almaviva in Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro. She returns to Montreal where she makes her role debut as Donna Anna in Don Giovanni with Orchestre symphonique de Montréal (Rafael Payare).


    On the concert platform this season, highlights include season opening concerts a with the Gürzenich-Orchester Köln (Andrés Orozco-Estrada), debuts with the Colorado Symphony in Strauss’s Vier Letzte Lieder and with the Real Orquesta Sinfónica de Sevilla in Verdi’s Requiem, as well as returned to the Luzerner Sinfonieorchester in Beethoven’s Symphony no. 9 (Michael Sanderling) and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra in Verdi’s Requiem (Sir Mark Elder). On the recital platform, Rangwanasha makes her Carnegie Hall recital debut alongside Simon Lepper and returns to Wigmore Hall.


    During the 2025/26 season, Rangwanasha made her Metropolitan Opera debut as Liù in Puccini's Turandot, a role for which she has received great critical acclaim and has performed for Washington National Opera, Hamburg State Opera and the Royal Ballet & Opera, Covent Garden, also joining them on jour in Japan. She recently made her role debut as Contessa d’Almaviva Le nozze di Figaro with Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal, later performing it in a fully staged production at Covent Garden. Other operatic highlights include the title role in Gluck’s Iphigénie en Tauride, Mathilde Guillaume Tell, Élisabeth de Valois Don Carlos and Elettra Idomeneo.


    Rangwanasha has made several recent concert debuts, including with the Los Angeles Philharmonic in Mahler's Symphony No. 4 (Elim Chan), London Philharmonic Orchestra in Vaughan Williams's A Sea Symphony (Sir Mark Elder), as well as with the Philharmonia Orchestra (Thomas Søndergård). Last season she performed in a gala concert as part of the opening ceremony of the G20 summit held in Johannesburg. Rangwanasha has appeared with the London Symphony Orchestra several times, performing alongside Sir Antonio Pappano in performances of Tippett's A Child of Our Time, Vaughan Williams’s A Sea Symphony and Mendelssohn's Elijah, the latter of which has been released through the LSO Live label in 2024.


    In great demand for her interpretation of Verdi's Requiem, she has performed the work with the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome and Salzburg (Sir Antonio Pappano), Bergen Philharmonic (Jader Bignamini), Atlanta Symphony Orchestra (Nathalie Stutzmann), with the BBC Symphony Orchestra (Sakari Oramo) at the First Night of the BBC Proms, and again with Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia the Wiener Konzerthaus and Basilica Papale di San Paolo Fuori le Mura (Daniel Harding), and the International Maifestspiele Wiesbaden.


    Other recent concert engagements include Strauss’s Vier Letzte Lieder at Colmar Festival  with the Orchestre Symphonique de la Monnaie (Alain Altinoglu), with the São Paulo Symphony Orchestra (Thierry Fischer) and Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra; Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915 with the Washington National Symphony Orchestra and Cincinnati Symphony (Marin Alsop); Mendelssohn’s Elijah with Chicago Symphony (James Conlon); Mendelssohn’s Lobgesang with Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia (Kazuki Yamada); Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 with the Munich Philharmonic (Nicholas Collon); Tippett's A Child of Our Time in her Edinburgh Festival debut with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra (Sir Andrew Davis) and with Royal Northern Sinfonia (Dinis Sousa); Poulenc's Stabat Mater with the Teatro Regio Torino Orchestra (James Conlon); Vaughan Williams’s A Sea Symphony (Sir Mark Elder) and Mahler’s Symphony no. 2 (Kahchun Wong) with The Hallé, as well as appearances at the Royal British Legion Festival of Remembrance and the BBC Proms.

    2026/27 season - 657 words. Not to be altered without permission.

Performances

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Opera Repertoire

Gluck
Iphigénie Iphigénie en Tauride

Mozart
Donna Anna Don Giovanni
Contessa Almavira Le nozze di Figaro
Elletra Idomeneo

Puccini
Mimi La bohème
Liù Turandot

Rossini
Mathilde Guillaume Tell

Verdi
Élisabeth de Valois Don Carlos

Concert Repertoire

Barber
Knoxville: Summer of 1915

Beethoven
Missa solemnis
Symphony No. 9

Berlioz
Les nuits d’été


Brahms
Ein deutsches Requiem


Dvořák
Stabat Mater

Elgar
The Apostles

Fauré
Requiem

Haydn
Nelson Mass

Mahler
Das Klagende Lied
Des Knaben Wunderhorn
Rückert-Lieder
Symphony No. 2

Symphony No. 4


Mendelssohn
Elijah
Symphony No. 2


Poulenc
Stabat Mater

Rossini 
Stabat Mater

Strauss
Vier letzte Lieder


Tippett
A Child of Our Time

Vaughan Williams
A Sea Symphony

Verdi 
Requiem


Wagner
Wesendonck Lieder

"The South African Soprano is the real deal: a singer with a voice of sumptuous, indecent beauty, and serious musicality."   

 

The Guardian, February 2026

'The South African soprano, Masabane Cecilia Rangwanasha, oozed star quality, effortlessly producing a large, lustrous tone which filled the hall, while superbly floating her high notes.'

Bachtrack, February 2025

'...the sheer magnificence of Masabane Cecilia Rangwanasha’s voice, which is fast becoming one of the glories of the age, all other considerations melt away...you simply luxuriate in the sheer sonic splendour of the voice itself: velvety from top to bottom, and beautiful even when rising to a fortissimo.'

The Times, March 2024

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Intermusica represents Masabane Cecilia Rangwanasha wordwide.

Nathan Morrison
Director / Head of Vocal & Opera
+44 7816 330 693
nmorrison@intermusica.com

LeOui van Rensburg
Artist Manager, Vocal & Opera
+44 7548 315 903
lvan-rensburg@intermusica.com

Emanuela Ciminna
Assistant Artist Manager, Vocal & Opera
+44 7841 952 375
eciminna@intermusica.co.uk

All artists

Contralto

Avery Amereau

Actor / Narrator

Amira Casar

Chansonnier

HK Gruber

Piano accompanist

Roger Vignoles

Saxophone

Branford Marsalis