97 young singers from 34 countries will attend the 2nd International Singing Competition for Baroque Opera Pietro Antonio Cesti 2011! The 2nd International Singing Competition for Baroque Opera Pietro Antonio Cesti 2011, held by the Innsbruck Festival of Early Music, has drawn a strong response from young singers worldwide. Out of the more than 120 applications, 97 young singers from 34 countries and five continents were chosen to participate in the 1st round. From 20 to 25 August, female singers (born 1980 and later) and male singers (born 1978 and later), who come from “A” as in Armenia to “U” as in USA, will face the jury in this Academy Project. Once again, some of the singers will be highly experienced, having worked with leading musical personalities such as Alan Curtis, Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Marc Minkowski, William Christie, Thomas Hengelbrock, René Jacobs, Philip Pickett, Jordi Savall, Fabio Biondi, Richard Egarr, Andrea Marcon and Ingo Metzmacher, as well as with famous ensembles such as Akademie der Alten Musik Berlin, Freiburger Barockorchester, Les Arts Florissants, English Concert, La Venexiana, New London Consort, La Cetra Barockorchester Basel and Balthasar Neumann Ensemble. The singers gave concerts as soloists in venues such as the Vienna Konzerthaus, the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, the Berlin Konzerthaus, the Essen Philharmonie, the Queen Elizabeth Hall, the Barbican Center, the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris, the Cité de la Musique in Aix-en-Provence, the Leipzig Gewandhaus, the Styriarte, the Boston Early Music Festival and the Göttingen International Handel Festival. They had engagements as opera singers in the Hungarian State Opera House in Budapest, the Hamburg State Opera, the Berlin State Opera Unter den Linden, the Vienna Volksoper, the Theater an der Wien, the Copenhagen Opera House, the Zurich Opera House, the Dresden Semperoper, the Frankfurt Opera House, La Scala in Milan and the Teatro La Fenice. The final concert is open to the public and will take place on 25 August (7 p.m., Tiroler Landeskonservatorium). The winner of a special prize will be voted directly by the audience. The 97 singers will be competing for three main prizes (4,000 euros, 3,000 euros and 2,000 euros), the Atle Vestersjø Young Artists Award (1,500 euros), the audience prize (1,000 euros) as well as special prizes from the Vienna Resonanzen Festival, the Musikfestspiele Potsdam-Sanssouci, the Theater an der Wien and the BAROQUE OPERA:YOUNG of the 2012 Innsbruck Festival of Early Music. These prizes are connected to follow-up engagements at the mentioned festivals and venues. The repertoire in the competition comprises arias and scenes from baroque operas by George Frideric Handel, Claudio Monteverdi, Henry Purcell, Francesco Cavalli, Pietro Antonio Cesti and Antonio Vivaldi. The focus lies on Monteverdi’s “L’Incoronazione di Poppea”, which will be performed in 2012 as a part of BAROQUE OPERA:YOUNG, a project of the Innsbruck Festival of Early Music. The first two rounds will be taking place from 21 to 23 August. On 24 August, there is a preparation round for the finals and on 25 August, the final round will take place, with ten finalists competing against each other. The high-class jury is composed of renowned representatives of the baroque opera scene: Alessandro De Marchi, conductor, artistic director of the Innsbruck Festival of Early Music, Sophie de Lint, designated opera director from 2012/13 of the Zurich Opera House, Claude Cortese, artistic director of the Angers Nantes Opera, Alan Curtis, conductor, Paolo Monacchi, artist manager, Paris, Joshua Winograde, director of artistic administration and casting at the Los Angeles Opera, and the chairman of the jury Sebastian F. Schwarz, director of artistic administration and casting at the Theater an der Wien.