Magdalena Kožená was born in the Czech city of Brno and studied voice and piano at the Brno Conservatory and later at Bratislava’s Academy of Performing Arts. She has been awarded several major prizes both in the Czech Republic and internationally, culminating in the Sixth International Mozart Competition in Salzburg in 1995.

Named Artist of the Year by Gramophone in 2004, Kožená has worked with many of the world’s leading conductors such as Claudio Abbado, Pierre Boulez, Gustavo Dudamel, Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Bernard Haitink, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Mariss Jansons, James Levine, Sir Charles Mackerras and Sir Roger Norrington. Her list of distinguished recital partners includes the pianists Daniel Barenboim, Yefim Bronfman, Malcolm Martineau, András Schiff and Mitsuko Uchida. Kožená’s understanding of historical performance practices has been cultivated in collaboration with outstanding period-instrument ensem- bles, including the English Baroque Soloists, the Gabrieli Consort & Players, Il Giardino Armonico, Les Musiciens du Louvre, La Cetra Barockorchester Basel, the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the Venice Baroque Orchestra and Le Concert d’Astrée. She is also in demand as soloist with the Berlin, Vienna and Czech Philharmonics and the Cleveland, Philadelphia and Royal Concertgebouw Orchestras.

Kožená first performed at the Salzburg Festival in 2002 as Zerlina in Mozart’s Don Giovanni and returned in 2013 as Idamante, a role she has also sung for the Glyndebourne Festival and in Berlin and Lucerne. Kožená made her first appearance at New York’s Metropolitan Opera in 2003 as Cherubino in Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro and has since been a regular guest. She sang Zerlina for the company’s tour to Japan in 2006 and returned to New York to take the title role in Jonathan Miller’s production of Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande in 2010/11. Her opera credits also include Angelina in Rossini’s La Cenerentola (Royal Opera House), Octavian in Richard Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier (Staatsoper Berlin and Baden Baden Easter Festival), the title role in Bizet’s Carmen (Salzburg Easter and Summer Festivals), Charpentier’s Médée (Theater Basel) and Martinů’s Juliette (Staatsoper Berlin).

Kožená was appointed a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French government in 2003 for her services to French music.