Zaza Gagua

Zaza Gagua is a prizewinning bass from Georgia with considerable experience in the Nordic countries. From the 2019-20, he will join the Norwegian Opera in Oslo as a member of the company’s Young Artists Programme.

Zaza was born in the Georgian capital Tbilisi and was awarded two degrees from the Tbilisi State University’s Faculty of Law. But his love for singing led him away from a legal career and into the vocal arts, which he studied at the Tbilisi State Conservatory including an exchange year at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki. He finished his formal vocal education at the opera school in the Swedish capital Stockholm, where he will graduate in May 2019.

Zaza made his debut as Oroveso in Bellini’s Norma, in a production with the Swedish company Operafabriken that toured Sweden and Denmark. He has also appeared as a soloist with the Stockholm Concert Orchestra. His operatic roles include Sparafucile in Verdi’s Rigoletto, Colline in Puccini’s La Bohème, Masetto in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, and has prepared and performed arias from operas by Rimsky-Korsakov, Bizet, Mozart and more. He is an experienced lieder singer and has taken the bass solo role in Verdi’s Requiem. He has appeared at the Kutaisi Opera Theatre, at KTH Stockholm and in the Grand Hall of the Tbilisi State Conservatory.

He will sing the role as Fiorello in Rossini’s The Barber of Seville with the Jönköping Sinfonietta in January 2019.

Zaza has participated in only one singing competition, organized in 2015 by the legendary Georgian baritone Lado Ataneli, which he won. He signed to Nordic Artists Management in December 2018.