Victoria de los Angeles was one of the finest lyric sopranos in the decades after World War II. She was born Victoria Gómez Cima. She learned to sing and play piano and guitar while still in school. She entered the Conservatorio de Liceo in Barcelona to study piano and singing, completing the six-year program in three, and graduating with full honors at the age of 18. Her membership in the Conservatory's Ars Musicae gave her wide exposure to the art song repertory and Baroque and Renaissance music.
Gustavo Dudamel's historic Mahler Project was a highlight of music-making in early 2012, for he led the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra of Venezuela in Gustav Mahler's nine completed symphonies, in a series of critically acclaimed concerts. The first CD to be issued from the marathon event is Deutsche Grammophon's 2013 release of the Symphony No. 9 in D major, one of the most challenging of Mahler's works to interpret and one of the most satisfying to hear when it is played with insight and originality.