Milena Kitic

Milena Kitic (Serbian: Милена Китић) (born 1968 in Belgrade, SR Serbia, then Yugoslavia) is a mezzo-soprano,she had finished her highschool at music school Mokranja in Belgrade.Her first professor was Andjelka Obradovic.Milena began her professional career with the Belgrade Opera, debuting in 1989 as Olga in Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin. She performed at the National Theater in Belgrade for 8 years. From 1997-99, Kitic performed at the Essen Opera in Germany, and later toured throughout Europe. In 1998, she made her American debut and also performed at Carnegie Hall that year. In 2002, she debuted with the Washington, D.C. Opera and the Los Angeles Opera. The following year, she performed with Opera Pacific, including a benefit performance with tenor Plácido Domingo. In October, 2005 she debuted with the Metropolitan Opera in New York, starring in Georges Bizet's Carmen and as Amneris in Giuseppe Verdi's Aida, roles which she has recently reprised for Opera Pacific.

Additionally, Kitic teaches master classes at Chapman University, the University of Southern California's Thornton School of Music and University of California, Irvine. Kitic is married to entrepreneur and former Yugoslav prime minister Milan Panić. The couple has homes in Newport Beach and Pasadena, California.

In March, 2007 Kitic announced her retirement from opera to raise her five-year-old son.