Waiting In
The Wings

SUZANNE CHESSLER

Special To The Jewish News

M

Photo by Glenn Triest

A Moldavian
star is trying to
put her U.S.
career on track.

ezzo-soprano Irina
Mishura Lekht-
man moved to
Michigan last
May as a political refugee.
Now she is working
toward relocating her
operatic career.
She and her engineer
husband decided to leave
Moldavia to give their 9-
year-old daughter reli-
gious and economic oppor-
tunities. "I'd like to have
auditions in the main
opera houses in the
United States," said Ms.
Lekhtman, who was
soloist with the Molda-
vian State Opera for
seven years and enter-
tained throughout Eur-
ope. "Maybe after that, I
can get roles. I'd like to
have contracts for opera
performances and con-
certs."
To her auditions, which
so far have been for the
Michigan Opera Theatre
and the Chicago Lyric
Opera House, Ms.
Lekhtman brings a musi-
cal history that reaches
back to her early child-
hood.
"My grandmother was
an opera singer in Russia,
and my mother and
father are musicians,"

Irina Mishura Lekhtman practices at JPM.

said Ms. Lekhtman, who
lived in Russia for the
first 20 years of her life.
"All my family loved
music.
"My father can play
piano, violin and accor-
dion. My mother can play
piano and sings beautiful-
ly. Both were teachers.
"When I was a little
girl, I heard opera and
Russian and Jewish
songs, and it was my
start. Each day I had
piano lessons.
"In college, I was a

pianist, not a singer. I
had many performances
with big orchestras, and I
played many concerts for
piano and orchestra.
"After that, people told
me I had a beautiful voice
and I should sing, so I
tried. I had many years of
study — six years in the
Moldavian State Institute
of Arts and three years of
post-graduate studies at
the Moscow-Gnesin State
Music Institute."
With her entry into pro-
fessional opera, she devel-

oped an extensive reper-
toire and learned Italian
to perfect her renditions.
Her two favorite parts
are Azucena in Verdi's Il
Trovatore and Adalgesa
in Bellini's Norma, which
show her range; the for-
mer role presents a tragic
character, and the latter
involves a lighter charac-
terization.
Although she never
learned Yiddish, she can
understand some of it and
used the language to pio-

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