Hibla Gerzmava was born in Pitsunda. In 1994 she graduated from the Tchaikovsky Moscow State Conservatory, completing a trainee-assistantship at the conservatory in 1996 (supervised by Irina Maslennikova). Over three years, she took an elective in organ studies.
Prize-winner at the Voci Verdiane competition (Busseto, Italy, 1993; 3rd prize), the Rimsky-Korsakov International Competition for Young Opera Singers (St Petersburg, 1994; 2nd prize), the Tenor Viñas Contest (Barcelona, 1994; 2nd prize) and the International Tchaikovsky Competition (Moscow, 1994; Grand Prix).
In 1995 she became a soloist at the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Moscow Music Theatre.
In 2001 she established the annual music festival Hibla Gerzmava Invites…, which for many years was presented by Svyatoslav Belza.
Has appeared at the Mariinsky Theatre, the Metropolitan Opera, the Royal Opera House (Covent Garden), the Teatro alla Scala, the Vienna State Opera, the Opéra national de Paris, Paris’ Théâtre des Champs-Élysées and Théâtre du Châtelet, Madrid’s Teatro Real, Barcelona’s Gran Teatre del Liceu, the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma, Florence’s Teatro Comunale, the Sofia Opera, the Bolshoi Theatre of Russia and the Semperoper Dresden among other venues as well as at the Ludwigsburger Schloßfestspiele in Germany. Has toured with concert programmes to Sweden, France, the Netherlands, Great Britain, Austria, Belgium, Spain, Greece, the USA, Japan and Turkey.
Hibla Gerzmava’s repertoire includes the roles of Lyudmila (Ruslan and Lyudmila), the Swan-Princess (The Tale of Tsar Saltan), the Queen of Shemakha (The Golden Cockerel), Louisa (Betrothal in a Monastery), Rosina (Rossini’s Il barbiere di Siviglia), Adina (L’elisir d’amore), Violetta Valéry (La traviata), Mimì and Musetta (La Bohème), Tatiana (Eugene Onegin), Parasha (Stravinsky’s Mavra), a Nymph (Marco da Gagliano’s La Dafne), Adele (Die Fledermaus), Nannetta (Falstaff), Donna Anna (Don Giovanni), Olympia, Antonia, Giulietta and Stella (Les Contes d'Hoffmann), Vitellia (La clemenza di Tito), Liù (Turandot), Amelia Grimaldi (Simon Boccanegra), Leonora (La forza del destino and Il trovatore), Desdemona (Otello), Elisabeth de Valois (Don Carlo), Eve (Haydn’s The Creation), the Guardian Angel (Emilio de Cavalieri’s Rappresentatione di anima et di corpo) and Médée, Norma, Anna Bolena and Lucia di Lammermoor in the eponymous operas as well as the soprano parts in Verdi’s Requiem and Janáček’s Glagolitic Mass.
Has recorded numerous CDs and DVDs, among them Ave Maria, Oriental Romances and Vocal Cycles and Romances by Russian Composers (works by Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, Myaskovsky and Prokofiev).
Recipient of the prizes Golden Orpheus (2001) and Casta Diva (2010) in the category “Best Female Singer”, the City of Moscow Prize for Literature and the Arts (2010), the Triumph prize (2011) and Russia’s Golden Mask National Theatre Award (2012 and 2016).
