Masabane Cecilia Rangwanasha
About this Artist
Rising star Masabane Cecilia Rangwanasha won the Song Prize at the 2021 BBC Cardiff Singer of the World competition and was awarded the 2024 Herbert von Karajan Prize at the Salzburg Easter Festival.
In the 2025/26 season, Rangwanasha makes her debut at the Metropolitan Opera as Liù in Puccini’s Turandot, a role she will also sing at the Royal Ballet and Opera. Later in the season, the soprano returns to RBO to make her role debut as Contessa Almaviva in Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro and performs the role in concert with the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal. In concert, Rangwanasha makes her debut with the Los Angeles Philharmonic in Mahler’s Symphony No. 4 (Elim Chan), Vaughan Williams’ A Sea Symphony with the London Philharmonic Orchestra (Mark Elder), Strauss’ Four Last Songs with both the Philharmonia Orchestra (Thomas Søndergård) and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (Kevin John Edusei), and Dvořák’s Stabat Mater with the National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland (Jiří Rožeň).
Last season, Rangwanasha performed with the Bergen Philharmonic (Jader Bignamini), Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome and at the Wiener Konzerthaus (Daniel Harding), and at International Maifestspiele Wiesbaden (Leo McFall). Rangwanasha made debuts with the Munich Philharmonic in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 (Nicholas Collon), with Teatro Regio Torino Orchestra in Poulenc’s Stabat Mater (James Conlon), and with São Paulo Symphony Orchestra in Four Last Songs (Thierry Fischer). Other recent performances include the Royal British Legion Festival of Remembrance at the Royal Albert Hall, Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 with the Hallé (Kahchun Wong), Tippett’s A Child of Our Time with the Royal Northern Sinfonia (Dinis Sousa) and London Symphony Orchestra (Antonio Pappano), Mendelssohn’s Elijah with the Oxford Philharmonic and the LSO, Vaughan Williams’ A Sea Symphony with the LSO (Pappano), and Four Last Songs with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra (Giancarlo Guerrero) and Cape Town Philharmonic (Kamal Khan).
In previous seasons, Rangwanasha made notable debuts as Liù in Turandot with the Washington National Opera and Hamburg State Opera, a role she also performed with the Royal Ballet and Opera on tour in Japan. Rangwanasha made her debuts with the LSO (Pappano) and Chicago Symphony Orchestra (James Conlon) in Mendelssohn’s Elijah, performed Verdi’s Requiem with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra (Nathalie Stutzmann), and returned to the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia (Pappano) andthe Hallé (Elder) for Rossini’s Stabat Mater.
Rangwanasha is a former BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artist.