Milka Stojanović

Milka Stojanović (Serbian: Милка Стојановић, translit. Milka Stojanović; 13 January 1937) is a Serbian soprano opera singer, who achieved international success. She sang with the Belgrade National Opera from 1960 and started her international career in 1962 when she appeared at the Edinburgh Festival. She was a singer of the Metropolitan Opera and the permanent guest singer of the Bolshoi Theatre and the Vienna State Opera. Stojanović was voted the "Golden voice", one of the four most beautiful operatic voices of the 20th century and is listed as one of the greatest performers of the Verdian repertoire in the Villa Verdi.

Milka Stojanović was born on 13 January 1937 in Belgrade. She studied world literature at the University of Belgrade Faculty of Philology, where she completed the course of the studies but didn't graduate. She studied singing in the Opera studio of Zdenka Zikova , in the La Scala Opera School (1964) and with Zinka Milanov in New York City.

Stojanović debuted at the age of 22 as Amelia in Verdi's Un ballo in maschera on the stage of the Belgrade Opera in 1959. From 1960 she was a lead soprano singer of the Belgrade Opera and sang in the first Yugoslav staging of Giuseppe Verdi's Nabucco (as Abigaille) and Attila (as Odabella), and Vincenzo Bellini's Norma.

She made her debut at the Metropolitan Opera in 1967 as Leonora in La forza del destino and went to sing with the company as Liù in Turandot, Amelia in Simon Boccanegra, Mimì in La bohème and the title roles of Aida and La Gioconda. She performed major soprano roles opposite Mario del Monaco, Franco Corelli, Plácido Domingo, Luciano Pavarotti, Tito Gobbi, Nicolai Gedda and Bruno Prevedi amongst others. Stojanović also extensively guested in the European opera houses, including the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, Hamburg State Opera, Cologne Opera, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Teatro dell'Opera di Roma, Venice, Palermo, Barcelona, Prague, Madrid, Syracuse, Romania, Hungary and Finland.