Milena Kitic
Milena Kitic (born 1968 in Belgrade, Yugoslavia) is a Serbian American operatic mezzo-soprano. She had finished her high school diploma at the Mokranjac Music School in Belgrade. Her first professor was Andjelka Obradovic.
Kitic began her professional career with the Belgrade Opera at the National Theatre in Belgrade, debuting in 1989 as Olga in Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin; she performed at this house for 8 years. From 1997 until 1999, Kitic performed at the Aalto Theatre in Essen, Germany, and later toured throughout Europe. In 1998, she made her American debut and performed at Carnegie Hall that year. In 2002, she debuted with the Washington National Opera and the Los Angeles Opera. The following year, she performed with Opera Pacific, including a benefit performance with tenor Plácido Domingo. In October 2005, she debuted with the Metropolitan Opera in New York, starring in Bizet's Carmen and as Amneris in Verdi's Aida, roles which she reprised for Opera Pacific.
Kitic teaches master classes at Chapman University, the University of Southern California's Thornton School of Music and the University of California, Irvine. Kitic is married to entrepreneur and former Yugoslav prime minister Milan Panić. The couple has homes in Newport Beach and Pasadena, California.
Sources
- Chapman University, Biography: Milena Kitic, Artist-in-Residence, Voice
- Farber, Jim, "Freeway Diva", Daily Breeze 18 February 2005 (accessed via subscription 29 January 2010)
- Metropolitan Opera, Performance record: Kitic, Milena (Mezzo Soprano) on the MetOpera Database
- Reed, Vita, The OC 50...profiles of the county's most influential business people: Milan Panic", Orange County Business Journal, 6 May 2002 (accessed via subscription 29 January 2010)
- Rosenberg, Marion Lignana, "Catfights, blood, glory: Ah, opera!", Newsday, 24 April 2004
- Smith, Thom, Soprano Sings for (Others') Suppers", The Palm Beach Post, 7 April 2000, p. 1E
- Stein, Jeannine, "The opera's on a grand scale, but not the diva" Los Angeles Times, 12 September 2005