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“Soprano of the century”, the “Stradivari of voices” - attributes assigned to the young artist by enthusiastic critics, colleagues and fans of Anja Harteros. The artist herself said in an interview about her approach to the roles she plays: “To express truth in music, the soul and one’s own feelings must be involved.”
It is the symbiosis of intense stage presence, perfect voice control and musical sensitivity that marks her out, both in opera performances and in lieder recitals and concerts, as a truly great artist.
Her international career began when she won the 1999 Cardiff Singer of the World competition and before long the artist was being invited to all the world’s major opera houses: the Metropolitan Opera in New York, La Scala in Milan, London’s Royal Opera House Covent Garden, the State Opera in Munich, Vienna, Berlin, Hamburg and Dresden, and the opera houses of Florence, Amsterdam, Paris, Geneva, Tokyo and many more, plus the Salzburg Festival.
Ms Harteros enjoyed phenomenal success in the 2009/2010 season as Elisabeth (in Tannhäuser, conducted by Zubin Mehta) at La Scala in Milan and as Amelia (in Simon Boccanegra, conducted by Daniel Barenboim) at the Staatsoper Unter den Linden as well as in the role of Desdemona in the new production of Otello at the Deutsche Oper in Berlin. The singer also received an enthusiastic reception from audiences and critics alike for her concert performances in Otello with the Mahler Chamber Orchestra under Daniel Harding at the Festspielhaus in Baden-Baden, the Philharmonie Luxembourg and the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris in autumn 2010.
In the 2010/2011 season Ms Harteros will appear as Violetta Valéry (La Traviata), Mimi (La Bohème), Alcina (Alcina), Leonora (Il Trovatore), Elisabetta (Don Carlos) and as the Marschallin (Der Rosenkavalier), while concert bookings will take her to venues in Geneva, Hamburg, Baden-Baden, Berlin, Mannheim and Karlsruhe.
In recognition of her outstanding artistic achievements, she was awarded the honorific title of Kammersängerin in Bavaria in July 2007.
Anja Harteros works with such celebrated conductors as Daniel Barenboim, Ivor Bolton, Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Bernard Haitink, Marek Janowski, Mariss Jansons, James Levine, Fabio Luisi, Zubin Mehta, Riccardo Muti, Kent Nagano, Sir Roger Norrington, Antonio Pappano and Christian Thielemann.
Her extensive operatic repertoire embraces such leading roles as Mimì (La Bohème), Elisabetta (Don Carlos), Desdemona (Otello), Violetta Valéry (LA TRAVIATA) Amelia (Simon Boccanegra), Alice Ford (Falstaff), Micaëla (Carmen), Fiordiligi (Così fan tutte), Contessa (Le nozze di Figaro), Donna Anna (Don Giovanni), Elettra (Idomeneo), Agathe (Der Freischütz), Eva (Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg), Elisabeth (Tannhäuser), Elsa (Lohengrin) and the title roles in Alcina and Arabella.
Recordings have appeared on CD and DVD featuring the artist in La Traviata and Alcina on the Farao Classics label, Idomeneo and Lohengrin on Decca, Mozart arias on Sony/BMG RCA Red Seal, Strauss's Four Last Songs on Sony/BMG Classical and Verdi's Requiem on EMI.
Her first Lieder recital was released in autumn 2009 by edel on the Berlin Classics label.
In 2010 Ms Harteros was awarded the French Arts Critics' Prize "Orphée d'Or" in Paris for her outstanding Lieder CD " Von ewiger Liebe" (of eternal love).
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