Anne Sofie von Otter

For the violinist, see Anne-Sophie Mutter.

Anne Sofie von Otter (born 9 May 1955) is a Swedish mezzo-soprano.

Contents

Biography

Von Otter was born in Stockholm, Sweden. Her father was the diplomat Göran von Otter and she grew up in Bonn, London and Stockholm. After studying in Stockholm and Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London, she was engaged by the Basel Opera, where she made her operatic début in 1983 as Alcina in Haydn's Orlando paladino. She made her Royal Opera House, Covent Garden début in 1985 and her La Scala debut in 1987. Her Metropolitan Opera début was in 1988 as Cherubino.[1]

She has had notable success in roles of Mozart, Handel, and Monteverdi. In recitals, she excels in the music of Mahler, Brahms, Grieg, Wolf and Sibelius. In 2001 she released an album with Elvis Costello, for which she won an Edison Award. Among the conductors she has worked with repeatedly are William Christie, Marc Minkowski, Claudio Abbado, John Eliot Gardiner, and Myung-Whun Chung. Most of her recitals and many of her recordings have been collaborations with Swedish pianist Bengt Forsberg. In 2003 Von Otter was awarded a Rolf Schock Prize in the musical arts category.

In 2006, von Otter sang the evangelist in the premiere of Sven-David Sandström's Ordet - en passion, on 24 March in Stockholm.[2]

In 2007, she released a highly-praised album of music written by composers imprisoned in the Nazi "model" ghetto of Theresienstadt concentration camp (also known as Terezin) prior to their transportation to the death camp of Auschwitz. She collaborated on this project with Christian Gerhaher (baritone) and chamber musicians. She has explained that the material has special personal meaning for her as her father, a Swedish diplomat in Berlin during World War II, had attempted unsuccessfully during the war to spread information that he had received from SS officer Kurt Gerstein about the Nazi death camps.[3]

She is married to Benny Fredriksson, an actor and theatre director, and has two children.

Recordings

Lieder and songs

Complete Operas

Aria recordings

Oratorios, Symphonies, etc

Other music

References

  1. ^ The Metropolitan Opera Association Database
  2. ^ Broman PF. Ordet – en passion. Introduction to Swedish Radio performance, accessed 4 January 2010
  3. ^ Lebrecht, Norman. "Tales of the Recording Angel." 31 October 2007. The Lebrecht Report. Accessed on 17 August 2011 at: http://www.scena.org/columns/lebrecht/071031-NL-angel.html

External links

Logic and philosophy
Willard Van Orman Quine (1993) · Michael Dummett (1995) · Dana Scott (1997) · John Rawls (1999) · Saul Kripke (2001) · Solomon Feferman (2003) · Jaakko Hintikka (2005) · Thomas Nagel (2008)
Mathematics
Elias M. Stein (1993) · Andrew Wiles (1995) · Mikio Sato (1997) · Yuri I. Manin (1999) · Elliott H. Lieb (2001) · Richard P. Stanley (2003) · Luis Caffarelli (2005) · Endre Szemerédi (2008)
Musical arts
Ingvar Lidholm (1993) · György Ligeti (1995) · Jorma Panula (1997) · Kronos Quartet (1999) · Kaija Saariaho (2001) · Anne Sofie von Otter (2003) · Mauricio Kagel (2005) · Gidon Kremer (2008)
Visual arts
Rafael Moneo (1993) · Claes Oldenburg (1995) · Torsten Andersson (1997) · Herzog & de Meuron (1999) · Giuseppe Penone (2001) · Susan Rothenberg (2003) · SANAA / Kazuyo Sejima + Ryue Nishizawa (2005) · Mona Hatoum (2008)