Orfeo ed Euridice, in 2012, she’ll sing Orfeo."} 66:{"position":12,"content":"Her rise is due to more than just a great, melodic voice – though that certainly helped. Rather, Baggio approaches opera singing like being an athlete."} 67:{"position":13,"content":"“It’s all about working the right muscles,” she says. “I train my muscles and my body, sometimes with yoga and pilates. My instrument is my body. But I need to be strict in my private life as well. Everything that has to do with my mental states can also affect the voice; how many hours I sleep, what I eat, if I had an argument with my husband the day before. It all affects my singing.”"} 68:{"position":14,"content":"What it all means is that opera’s combination of acting and singing makes for a living, breathing performance. There’s no faking it, no posing. And that’s exactly why Baggio insists on reading and understanding the entirety of every libretto for every show she’s in, even if the text is in a language she doesn’t speak."} 69:{"position":15,"content":"Conversational in Italian and German and fluent in Hebrew and English, Baggio is sure to read “all the other characters’ parts,” she says. “I want to know my relationship with each character. Can you imagine singing in Italian about loving someone, but not knowing what you were singing? If I don’t speak the language, I have to translate, and learn the libretto by heart.”"} 6a:{"position":16,"content":"While Italian is Baggio’s favorite language to sing (“There’s a reason the opera was born there,” she says), Hebrew falls farther down the ladder: “I think it’s the hardest I’ve sung, with all the ‘ch’ and ‘ah’ sounds.”"} 6b:{"position":17,"content":"In Hebrew or not, though, the Israeli public is picking up on the art of opera. Last year’s annual Israeli Opera performance, of Mozart’s The Magic Flute, in Tel Aviv’s HaYarkon Park, drew thousands."} 6c:{"p

Born to sing

Hila Baggio has been performing – and loving it – for as long as she can remember.