Verdi Requiem
But top kudos must go to Jasmina Halimic, whose lustrous and creamy soprano took my breath away in several spots. In particular, her smoldering intensity and heart-rending sense of entreaty made the final “Libera Me” movement something I won’t soon forget.
- Lindsay Koob - Charleston Today
Halimic used the demanding work to display both her impressive talents and vocal stamina.
- Nicholas Luciano - Salisbury Post
Marguerite - Faust, Charles Gounod
There was some attractive singing -- even some marvelous singing, from soprano Jasmina Halimic in the role of Marguerite. Only Halimic was able to unpack her character, turning this tale -- adapted from Goethe by librettists Jules Barbier and Michel Carré -- into something meaty and believable. She has charisma: She sang, we listened. In the ballad "King of Thule," her voice was silvery and delicate, striking a natural tone of serenity, with marvelous pizzicato accompaniment from the strings in the orchestra, conducted by David Rohrbaugh. During the "Jewel Song," Marguerite's most famous number, Halimic embodied a young woman's awakening to her feelings of love -- and to her ability to inspire such feelings. Here her singing was lustrous, following the curving shape of Gounod's lines. ... Even so, here in the second of three acts, "Faust" was most effective, thanks to her mostly steadying presence -- and thanks to Gounod's love music, which is shapely, spacious and gleaming with color. The "Thinks Quartet" unfolded beautifully, with its dove-tailed intricacies. And Halimic's love duets with Boyer were fine-spun. Her voice was fragrant as a night garden, mirroring the star-lit garden effects of set designer Steven C. Kemp and lighting designer David Lee Cuthbert.
- Richard Scheinin - The Mercury News
Jasmina Halimic’s marvelous power and control bring an aching poignancy to her Marguerite.
- Paul Myrvold - Out & About Magazine
The voice of Marguerite (Jasmina Halimic),which has been lyrical up until now, becomes soaring and ecstatic as she cries out to the angels to save her soul. She is saved. The music and the voices are magnificent.
- Bet Messmer - The Stunning Post
Marguerite was portrayed by Jasmina Halimic, the Bosnian soprano who made outstanding vocal flights throughout.
- Mort Levine - Milpitas Post
Anna Karenina, David Carlson
Anna Karenina: First Rate - vocal and visual delight... The evening's chief glory was the superb performance of soprano Jasmina Halimic in the title role, a virtuoso display of technical prowess and expressive transparency. Deploying her bright-edged and vibrant tone with utmost mastery, she let Carlson's arching vocal phrases convey everything from amorous abandon to wounded pride.
- Joshua Kosman - San Francisco Chronicle
The first thing that one notices about Jasmina Halimic is that she simply looks the part, owing to her dark features and Bosnian background. The second thing is her vibrato, which is absolutely perfect. She brings out the alluring quality of extended lines, notably the sustained vowels that meander back and forth like overwide trills, and handles several alarming top notes with aplomb. It's also fascinating to watch her navigate a lengthy unaccompanied passage in Act 2 while sitting with her back to the audience, looking into a mirrored screen. The best feature of Halimic's acting is the subtlety of the gestures she uses to potray Anna's growing depression. This is how a noblewoman loses her mind - with taste.
- Michael J. Vaughn - The Opera Critic
An even greater impression was made by the performer of the role of Anna, Jasmina Halimic. She has an unbelievably beautiful, clear, even, effluent soprano voice with a free top, wonderful technical resources and a deep interpretative understanding of her character. Without a doubt, she can already be labeled an outstanding singer.
- H. Anatolyev – KSTATI, Russian American Weekly Newspaper
The opening-night cast also unveiled a star of the future in the title role - Halimic brought down the house at the California Theatre with her fine-tuned spinto soprano---a lovely instrument to hear... She skillfully energized Anna’s very unhappy marriage, her dalliance and pregnancy with a born wanderer, her exile by 19th-century society, and the agonizing choice she ultimately had to make between the lover and her children.
- Paul Hertelendy - www.artssf.com
Elettra - Idomeneo, W. A. Mozart
Jasmina Halimic's Elettra was arrestingly sung and vividly acted.
- George Loomis - Opera Magazine (UK)
Halimic was slinky as a figure on an ancient Greek urn. She writhed, unleashing her plush and powerful voice, patiently phrasing the aria's lamentations, then venting her boundless anger. Oh madness! Oh Fury!
- Richard Scheinin – Mercury News
...capped by the ever-madder, scenery-chewing, floor-writhing dramatic soprano Jasmina Halimic, whose seething Elettra was at first comic, then furious, and finally quite scary.
- D. Rane Danubian - artssf.com
Soprano Jasmina Halimic has the kind of Queen of the Night/Lady Macbeth/Tosca intensity that makes a perfect match for Elettra, particularly in her black-and-gold Evil Queen dress (designed by Johann Stegmeir). Halimic...stole the show with Elettra’s final-act freakout, “D’Oreste, d’Ajace.”
- Michael J. Vaughn - The Opera Critic
The biggest voice was Jasmina Halimic (Electra), who stopped the show with her last act display of self-destructive revenge and despair...the voice and personality are commandingly dramatic.
- Scott MacClelland – The Metro News
Opera San Jose's remarkable Bosnian soprano Jasmina Halimic was particularly effective with a fiercely dramatic "D'Oreste d'Ajace".
- Mort Levine – Milpitas Post
Como Elettra, Jasmina Halimic cantó bien y en su maravilloso timbre de voz las melismas en sus arias sonaran exquisitas. Su representación de la mujer celosa de Ilia estuvo realista.
- Iride Aparicio - LA Oferta
Nedda - I pagliacci, Ruggiero Leoncavallo
Jasmina Halimic takes the darker fourth-act shades of last season’s Mimi and applies them to Nedda, showing the ability to produce bits of onstage thunder. Her performance of the birdsong aria, “Stridono lassu,” is particularly affecting, as is the following duet with Silvio.
- Michael J. Vaughn - The Opera Critic
The love duet between Nedda (wife of Canio, who runs the troupe) and Silvio (Nedda's local lover) was delivered with a rush of fireworks by soprano Jasmina Halimic and baritone Krassen Karagiozov.
- Richard Scheinin - Mercury News
Recital with the Russian Chamber Arts Society, Program: Russian Contemporary Art Songs
Appearing on the stage with a majestic flow, her gifts as an actor and her striking beauty were a great compliment to her magnificent voice and interpretive skills. Halimic’s ability to beautifully convey dark colors with a soaring voice particularly came through in the poem by Akhmatova, 'The Grey-eyed King.'"
- H. Polgar - FestivalDC
Mimì - La bohème, Giacomo Puccini
Saturday night's opening performance had more than its share of stars, beginning with soprano Jasmina Halimic, as Mimì, the doomed seamstress. She gave this role full measure, unspooling Puccini's sparkling song with unrushed control and exquisite lyric tone, topping her phrases with plush and expansive high notes.
- Richard Scheinin – Mercury News
Halimic presented Mimi as lost and troubled, and thus easily swept up by Rodolfo's charisma. Even when terminally ill, she lit up the stage and the entire hall. When Mimi's light finally does go out with chilling minor chord in the brass, the sadness of the loss was palpable. At the height of their passion the pair's duet in the snow penetrated deep into the heart.
- Beeri Moalem, San Jose Classical Music Examiner
Soprano Jasmina Halimic enjoys these same advantages – she just looks like Mimì, and also possesses a gorgeous lyric tone, so broad and buttery at the top that it evokes thoughts of Tebaldi. (All in all, these two are enough to make an opera fanatic pass out.) Halimic’s lines are strikingly spare, more involved with character than display, but she does provide some enchanting dynamic swells – notably in a unison line with Boyer in “O soave fanciulla.” The real revelation, however, is Mimì’s dialogue with Marcello in Act 3, as she relates her recent breakup with Rodolfo and her worries about her health. Halimic and stage director Timothy Near have fashioned a Mimì tormented by shadows, bringing an intensity to this scene that I’ve never witnessed.
- Michael J. Vaughn – The Opera Critic
Jasmina Halimic as the dying Mimì harnessed her considerable power to give her character an aching poignancy and simplicity that drew the audience in to hang on each musical utterance. Her singing was as easy and confident as breath, soaring in forte and subtle in piano.
- Paul Myrvold – Out & About Magazine
Jasmina Halimic, who we saw in the performance of “Anna Karenina,” posses a beautiful, easy, even and well-carrying voice. The image of a terminally ill, doomed woman that she created begets great compassion. She is very sincere and authentic in every aspect of her portrayal.
- H. Anatolyev – KSTATI, Russian American Weekly Newspaper
Magda de Civry - La rondine, Giacomo Puccini
Magda, the kept woman, is performed with great sensitivity and passion by Jasmina Halimic, a native of Bosnia. Her range is impressive and her acting can move one to tears in the traditional Puccini way especially when she walks out on her lover.
- Mort Levine – Mercury News
Halimic’s strength and grace.. beckon us to join her in celebrating life in all its manifestations. ..including famed aria Chi il bel sogno di Doretta, with a rare blend of the technical proficiency of opera and the easy grace...
- Synchronized Chaos
Soprano Jasmina Halimic in the role of Magda dominated the stage thanks to a number of factors. Jose Maria Condemi’s stage direction channeled the entire ensemble’s visual energy towards the alluring courtesan’s beautiful figure. The diva basked in this energy and radiated it outward again with an attractive stage presence. The beautiful lines that Puccini bestowed upon this role didn’t hurt either. But the main reason for her dominance was the smoothly striking amplitude of her voice—easily the most powerful in the Sunday matinée cast.
- Beeri Moalem - San Jose Classical Music Examiner
Their mistress, Magda, sung by a newcomer Jasmina Halimic, was also a fine singer and a stage actress, changing from a dignified Parisian hostess to shyly vulnerable “shop girl” in The Café and then finally a passionate lover in Act III. Her final painful renunciation of the love of her life rang with emotional sincerity that evoked audience bravos.
- Susan Steinberg - The Independent
This Puccini gem was outstanding, especially the second act in which set, chorus, acting and singing was beyond anything I had experienced before at San Jose. Jasmina Halimic who played Magda, the lead, was spectacular!
- Knowledge and Thoroughness
Irene Dalis Competition Review
Jasmina Halmic, a sensuous brunette from Bosnia-Herzegovina, stars with Opera San José and gave a smashing performance in this fifth annual Dalis vocal competition. While others stood leashed to the piano, Halmic, as Mozart’s Electra, moved around, at once in heat and then in dread, singing “Tutte nel cor.”
- Marc Macnamara – San Francisco Classical Voice
Tatyana - Eugene Onegin, P. I. Tchaikovsky
Jasmina Halimic was Tatyana. She possesses a meltingly sweet soprano and is a very graceful actress as well.
- Anne Arenstein - Opera L
In Saturday night’s cast, Jasmina Halimic sang beautifully as the graceful, lovely Tatyana.
- George Walker - WFIU
The woman, the opera’s heroine, Tatyana, came to life thanks to Jasmina Halimic. If anything, Halimic, on Saturday, was even more right for the role, with fragility of appearance and a soprano imbued with tears. (Halimic) captured the part’s shift from excitable girlhood to assured adulthood, into a woman capable of overcoming retained feelings for Onegin and staying loyal to the man she married.
- Peter Jacobi - The Herald Times
Valencienne - The Merry Widow, Franz Lehar
Jasmina Halimic kept reminding me of a prettier Carol Burnett.
- George Walker - WFIU
