Sophie Junker

Sophie Junker is a Belgian operatic soprano, focused on Baroque music, especially works by Handel.

Life and career

Junker, born in 1985, was first trained by her father, Stéphan Junker, a voice teacher at the Verviers conservatoire. She then studied voice in Namur at the IMEP and at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London.
She achieved international recognition when she won the Handel Competition in London in 2010. In 2012 she won the international Cesti Competition of the Innsbruck Festival of Early Music.

Roles

2012: Amor in Gluck's Orfeo ed Euridice at the Angers-Nantes Opéra
2012: Israelite Woman in Handel's Esther at the Göttingen International Handel Festival
2013: Galatea in Handel's Acis and Galatea at the Royal Opera of Versailles
2013: Belinda in Purcell's Dido and Aeneas at the Innsbruck Festival of Early Music
2013: Wanda in Offenbach's La Grande-Duchesse de Gerolstein at the Opéra Royal de Wallonie, Liège
2013: Italian Woman in Charpentier's Médée at the English National Opera
2014: Caio in Vivaldi's Ottone in villa at the Copenhagen Opera Festival
2015: Melanto in Monteverdi's Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria at the Enescu Festival in Bucharest
2015: Drusilla in Monteverdi's L’incoronazione di Poppea, Enescu Festival
2015: Anna Reich in Nicolai's Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor, Opéra Royal de Wallonie
2015: Venus in Purcell's King Arthur, Festival de Beaune
2015: Hélène in Chabrier's Une éducation manquée, Lafayette Opera, Washington, D.C.
2015: title role of Viardot's Cendrillon, Opéra Royal de Wallonie, Liège
2015: Phoebe in Rameau's Castor et Pollux, Saint John's Smith Square
2016: Aspasia in Handel's Alexander Balus, London Festival
2016: Cleis in Jean-Paul-Égide Martini's Sapho, Opera Lafayette, New York City and Washington, D.C.
2016: second Woman in Purcell's Dido and Aeneas, Opéra de Lausanne
2017: Proserpine and Eurydike in Charpentier's La descente d'Orphée aux enfers, Wigmore Hall, Den Haag
2017: First Lady in Mozart's Die Zauberflöte, Opéra de Limoges
2018: Cunegonda in Vinci's , Theater an der Wien
2018: Elisetta in Cimarosa'a Il matrimonio segreto, Opéra Royal de Wallonie, Liège
2018: Drusilla in Monteverdi's L'incoronazione di Poppea, Staatsoper Berlin
2019: Venus in Giovanni Legrenzi 's La divisione del mondo, Opéra national du Rhin in Strasbourg, Nancy and Versailles Opéra
2019: Pergolesi's Stabat Mater and François Couperin's Leçons de ténèbres, in concert at the Versailles Opéra
2019: title role of Georg Caspar Schürmann's Die getreue Alceste, Schlosstheater Schwetzingen
2019: Sigismondo in Handel's Arminio, Göttingen Festival
2019: Amarilli in Handel's Il pastor fido, Gliwice and Handel Festival, Halle
2021: Angelica in Vivaldi's Orlando furioso, La Seine Musicale
2021: Asteria in Handel's Tamerlano, Moscow
2022: Cleopatre in Handel's Giulio Cesare in Egitto, touring in the Netherlands, Göttingen Festival

Recordings

2012: Bach: Secular Cantatas vol. 2, with Bach Collegium Japan, cond: Masaaki Suzuki, BIS
2014: Sacrifices (Filia in Carissimi's Jephte with La Nuova Musica, Harmonia Mundi
2016: Handel's Esther with Laurence Cummings, Accent
2016: Grétry's L’épreuve villageoise, Naxos
2017: Stravaganza d'amore with Pygmalion, cond. Raphaël Pichon, Harmonia Mundi
2020: La Francesina", Handel's Nightingale", Le Concert de l'Hostel Dieu, cond. Franck-Emmanuel Comte

Awards

2010 First prize London Handel Competition
2012 First prize international competition for Baroque opera Innsbruck Cesti Competition
2020: Choc de Classica for La Francesina
2020: Diamant from Opéra Magazine for La Francesina
2020: Forum Opéra trophy in the category best album of the year for La Francesina
2021: Best Baroque vocal album of the year of International Classical Music Awards for ''La Francesina''