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Efthimios Mihalopoulos

Soloist, Baritone
He was born in Athens on 17/11/1940 and obtained his diploma from the Hellenic Conservatory of Music and Arts in 1961. He studied on a scholarship at the Accademia Chigiana, Siena and the Giuseppe Verdi Conservatorio, Milan. He won first prize at the singing competitions Gian Battista Viotti (Vercelli, 1961), Achille Peri (1965) and Gaetano Donizetti (1967). He also appeared in Siena, Verona, Florence, Piacenza, Palermo, Faenza, Trieste and La Scala, Milan, where during the 1971/72 season he sang in productions of the operas Alceste, Lohengrin and Le Baccanti by Giorgio Federico Ghedini. Mihalopoulos performed at various festival including those of Athens (1967, 1970, 1980), Wexford (1969-70), Las Palmas (1970) and Dublin (1971), as well as at the Caracas Opera Festival (1972) and Maggio Musicale Fiorentino. He has also sang in Lucia di Lammermoor (1970) in Nice (France) and Luisa Miller (1972) in Barcelona. He gave concerts in Italian and other European halls. He was part of the cast in Nino Rota’s opera Aladino e la lampada magica, presented at the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma and directed by Renato Castellani. Since 1992, he was regularly appearing in recitals in Athens and other greek cities. He was the first singer who performed Manos Hadjidakis’ Paramithi choris onoma (Tale with no name) in 1959. His repertoire included Lohengrin, Turandot, Aida, Madama Butterfly, Mefistofele, Ernani, Rigoletto and Adriana Lecouvreur. Some of his performances have been recorded for posterity. He died in Athens on 23/7/2007. He collaborated with the GNO in two productions: Salome (as first Nazarene, Athens Festival, 1979/80), and Il barbiere di Siviglia (Don Basilio, 1990/91).