Performance Database

The Berlin mezzo-soprano studied at the Royal Academy of Music in London and at Indiana University, Bloomington. She became internationally known as Erda in Der Ring des Nibelungen in the Frank Castorf production under Kirill Petrenko and Marek Janowski at the Bayreuth Festival, which she sang for five summers. Permanent engagements took her to the Theater Osnabrück and the Deutsches Nationaltheater Weimar, where she enjoyed great success as Carmen and in Der Ring des Nibelungen. Her broad repertoire also includes roles such as Amneris (Aida), Dalila (Samson et Dalila), Baba the Turk (The Rake's Progress), Mrs. Quickly (Falstaff), Herodias (Salome), Laura (La Gioconda), Gora (Medea), Ježibaba (Rusalka), Ulrica (Un ballo in maschera), Dritte Dame (Die Zauberflöte), Schwertleite, Flosshilde, 2. Norn, Waltraute (Der Ring des Nibelungen), Duenna (Die Verlobung im Kloster), Old Lady (Candide), Marcellina (Le nozze di Figaro) and Countess Helfenstein (Mathis der Maler).

In concert, she has performed Beethoven's 9th Symphony, Missa solemnis and Mass in C, Mahler's 2nd and 8th Symphonies and Das Lied von der Erde, Brahms' Alto Rhapsody, Bernstein's Jeremiah Symphony, Mendelssohn's Elias, Bach's Johannespassion, Berio's Folk Songs, Dvořák's Stabat mater, Verdi's Requiem, Wagner's Wesendonck Lieder, Schönberg's Lied der Waldtaube and Berlioz' Les nuits d'été.

She has worked with conductors such as George Alexander Albrecht, Bertrand de Billy, Michael Boder,Ivor Bolton, Carl St. Clair, Jesús López-Cobos, Christoph Eschenbach, Adam Fischer, Asher Fisch, Lawrence Foster, James Gaffigan, Valery Gergiev, Pablo Heras-Casado, Anthony Hermus, Daniel Huppert, Dmitri Jurowski, Kirill Karabits, Lothar Koenigs, Fabio Luisi, Antonello Manacorda, Enrique Mazzola, Zubin Mehta, Henrik Nánási, Adrien Perruchon, Kirill Petrenko, Christian Thielemann, Sebastian Weigle, and Lothar Zagrosek, as well as directed by Robert Carsen, Frank Castorf, Mariam Clément, La Fura dels Baus, Achim Freyer, Jean-Louis Grinda, Claus Guth, Barrie Kosky, Marco Arturo Marelli, Olivier Py, and Michael Schulz.

Guest appearances have taken her to the Salzburg and Bregenz Festivals and the festivals in Glyndebourne, Edinburgh, Adelaide, Auckland, as well as to London, Barcelona, Madrid, Valencia, Bilbao, Paris, Marseille, Bordeaux, Monte-Carlo, Budapest, Geneva, Hamburg, Munich, Düsseldorf, Dresden, Frankfurt, Baden-Baden, Amsterdam, Lisbon, Tokyo, Seoul.

She has won prizes at international competitions such as Rheinsberg, Francisco-Viñas, Hilde Zadek and the Wagner Competition Seattle.

This season began with the Wesendonck Lieder at the pro Musica Festival in Rhodes, then she made another guest appearance at the Komische Oper Berlin as Leokadja Begbick and as Cupido in Barrie Kosky's acclaimed Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny and Orpheus in the Underworld productions, returned to Chemnitz as Amneris in Aida, made her role and house debut in Seville in Robert Carsen's Jenufa as Alte Burja, was heard in concert as Geneviève in Pelléas et Mélisande, as Quickly in Falstaff and as Frau mit violetter Nase in Die Nacht vor Weihnachten in radio concert productions in Paris, Katowice and Berlin respectively.