Irina Bikulova (soprano).
Honoured Artist of Russia.

Irina was born in the city of Pskov. In 1988 graduated with honours from the Moscow Conservatoire where she studied in the class of Bela Rudenko, in 1990 she accomplished her training course as assistant in the same class. Among Irina’s teachers at the Conservatoire were outstanding masters of singing Tamara Milashkina and Irina Arkhipova.

In 1989 the young singer became Laureate of the XIII All-Union Glinka Vocalists’ Competition and a year later Irina successfully joined the Bolshoi Opera Company as a probationer. Next year she was promoted to the position of soloist, when she made her debut as Donna Anna in " The Stone Visitor ", which at once got her the leading position in the troupe. During her first years at the theatre she worked with the accompanist L. À. Mogilevskaya, with whom she prepared the majority of her roles. Irina works as a chamber singer too. She worked with G.V. Sviridov on his cycle " Petersburg songs " (words by À. Block), in 1995 she sang a solo program of musical pieces by Sviridov in Moscow and St. Petersburg, with some romances sung by her for the first time.

She enjoyed a great success when touring Europe (Belgium, Austria, Germany, Italy, England, Ireland, Finland, Norway, Bulgaria, Switzerland etc.), as well as the USA, Japan, China, Korea, as an invited soloist.