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Christiane Oelze

About this Artist

CHRISTIANE OELZE has sung in the most renowned opera houses and in the most prestigious concert venues of Europe, the USA and Japan, and performed with conductors Claudio Abbado, Pierre Boulez, Riccardo Chailly, Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Carlo Maria Giulini, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Sir Neville Marriner, Kurt Masur, Sir Roger Norrington, Sir Simon Rattle, Helmuth Rilling, Seiji Ozawa, and Esa-Pekka Salonen.

Born in Cologne, Ms. Oelze first made a name for herself in the operatic world with Mozart roles: Pamina (The Magic Flute) with Sir Yehudi Menuhin, Leipzig 1992, tour of Europe with Sir John Eliot Gardiner in 1994) and Susanna (The Marriage of Figaro, Glyndebourne 2000, Salzburg 2001). She followed with Mélisande (Pelléas et Mélisande) at Glyndebourne again; classical modern roles followed, including Regina (Mathis der Mahler) at the Royal Opera House and Covent Garden, and Anne Truelove (The Rake´s Progress) at the Glyndebourne Festival. She returned to Glyndebourne for Ilia in Idomeneo in 2003, and sang her first Sophie in Der Rosenkavalier at the Hamburg Staatsoper in 2002. Her debut as the Countess in The Marriage of Figaro is planned for the Ruhr Festival in 2004.

She also has become very established for her Lieder singing, with esteemed accompanists Eric Schneider, Rudolf Jansen, Malcom Martineau, Julius Drake, and Roger Vignoles at dozens of European venues, like the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival in 2002. With pianist Mitsuko Uchida, Ms. Oelze performed Schubert Lieder and Alban Berg´s Seven Early Songs in New York's Carnegie Hall in April 2003. She looks forward to future Lieder-Abends in Bremen, Ingolstadt, Lisbon, and Valencia.

Ms. Oelze has performed and recorded sacred music with conductors Philippe Herreweghe (Brahms' Requiem) and Ludwig Güttler (Bach's Christmas Oratorio). She helps inaugurate the new Walt Disney Hall October 2003 with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, singing Mahler's 2nd conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen. Future oratorio appearances include Brahms' Requiem at the Kennedy Center, and Beethoven's 9th with the Berlin Philharmonic (conducted by Simon Rattle), which will tour to Lucerne, London, and Birmingham.

Christiane Oelze's recordings include many discs of Lieder and cantatas by Schubert, Schumann, Eisler, Webern and Wolf; Orff's Carmina Burana; Beethoven´s Fidelio; J.S. Bach´s Christmas Oratorio, St. John and St. Matthew Passions; French and Spanish songs (with pianist Rudolf Jansen); Mozart´s C-minor Mass; Brahms' Requiem; chamber music by Paul Hindemith and Arnold Schönberg; and J. Strauss' Zigeunerbaron.