Petra Lang

After completing violin studies she studied singing with Gertie Charlent at the Akademie für Tonkunst in Darmstadt and at the Peter Cornelius Conservatory in Mainz, where she attended the Opera School with Harro Dicks at the same time. After completing her studies in 1989 she immediately auditioned for a master class with Ingrid Bjoner with whom she studied until 2006. She was involved in masterclasses with Brigitte Fassbaender, Hans Hotter, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Peter Schreier and also studied her Wagner roles with Astrid Varnay.

In 1989, Petra Lang joined the Opera Studio of the Bavarian State Opera in Munich. In 1990, she moved to the Theater Basel, sang in 1991 at the Städtischen Bühnen Nuremberg and 1992-1995 at Theater Dortmund. Here she could develop numerous roles of the lyric mezzo-soprano repertoire. In addition, she was engaged as Tamiri in Mozart's "Il Re Pastore" at De Nederlandse Opera Amsterdam, as Virtu in Monteverdi's "L'Incoronazione di Poppea" at the Salzburg Festival, as Fenena in Verdi's "Nabucco" at the Bregenz Festival and as Flora in "La Traviata" at the Zurich Festival.

In 1994/95 season, she turned to the work of Richard Wagner, and sang her first Waltraute (“Götterdammerung”) and Fricka (“Das Rheingold”, “Die Walküre”) in the Dortmund Ring cycle. Under the opera direction of Brigitte Fassbaender at the Staatstheater Braunschweig from 1995-1997 she added to her repertoire Brangäne (“Tristan und Isolde”), Judith (“Duke Bluebeard's Castle”), Marie (“Wozzeck”) and Eboli (“Don Carlos”).

Then Petra Lang decided to become freelance and since then sings on the world’s greatest stages: Royal Opera House London (Brangäne, Waltraute, Kundry, Ortrud, Ariadne, Judith, Foreign Princess), De Nederlandse Opera Amsterdam (Brangäne, Cassandre, Venus, Kundry), Bavarian State Opera Munich (Brangäne, Venus), Deutsche Oper Berlin (Waltraute, Brangäne, Venus, Sieglinde, Cassandre, Ortrud), Hamburg State Opera (Waltraute, Kundry), Staatstheater Stuttgart (Adriano), Opera Cologne (Sieglinde), Nationaltheater Mannheim (Cassandre, Ariadne, Kundry), Vienna State Opera (Fricka, Waltraute, Brangäne, Kundry, Ortrud), De Vlaamse Opera Antwerp (Brangäne), Grand Théâtre de Genève (Amneris, Kundry, Judith, Ortrud), Zurich Opera House (Sieglinde), Teatro San Carlo, Naples (Sieglinde), Accademia di Santa Cecilia Rome (Venus), Teatro La Fenice Venice (Sieglinde), La Scala Milan (Venus), Oviedo (Brangäne), Teatro de la Maestranza Seville (Sieglinde), Budapest (Ortrud), Opera Nationala Bucharest (Ortrud), Tokyo (Kundry), Teatro Municipal di Santiago de Chile (Brangäne), San Diego Opera (Venus), Baltimore Opera (Venus), Lyric Opera of Chicago (Brangäne), San Francisco Opera (Venus).

At the Bayreuth Festival Petra Lang has sung Brangäne in "Tristan und Isolde" (2005/2006), and as Ortrud in “Lohengrin” by Hans Neuenfels in 2011. In addition to her successes on the opera stage, she is an internationally sought-after concert singer who is known mainly for her sensitive interpretation of the works of Gustav Mahler. On the concert podium Petra Lang also sings Wagner's Wesendonck Lieder, Berlioz’s Les nuits d 'été, Berg's Seven Early songs and the Wozzeck Fragments, Schoenberg's Songs Op.8 and the Wood Dove in Gurrelieder, Zemlinsky’s Maeterlinck songs, Sibelius, Duparc, Lalo, Strauss orchestral songs, in Beethoven's 9th Symphony and the Missa Solemnis.She performs worldwide with all the major orchestras under the direction, amongst others, of Claudio Abbado, Pierre Boulez, Christian Badea, Semyon Bychkov, Riccardo Chailly, M. W. Chung, Andrew Davis, Colin Davis, Christoph von Dohnányi, Charles Dutoit, Christoph Eschenbach, Adam Fischer, Ivan Fischer, Bernard Haitink, Marek Janowski, Armin Jordan, Philippe Jordan, Zubin Mehta, Riccardo Muti, Andris Nelsons, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Jukka-Pekka Saraste, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Leif Segerstam, Simon Rattle, Donald Runnicles, Peter Schneider, Jeffrey Tate, Christian Thielemann, Silvio Varviso, Simone Young.

Also Petra Lang has a successful career as a Lieder singer. She sings a comprehensive repertoire of Lieder from Franz Schubert to Anton Webern, and works with the pianists Adrian Baianu, Malcolm Martineau, Carmen Piazzini, Maurizio Pollini, Wolfram Rieger, Charles Spencer, and Einar Steen-Noekleberg. Their song recitals have been performed at, amongst others, Wigmore Hall (London), Concertgebouw (Amsterdam), Schubertiade (Feldkirch), Semper Opera House (Dresden), La Scala (Milan), Carnegie-Weill Hall (New York), Salle Pleyel (Paris) and at the Edinburgh Festival.

Petra Lang is a passionate pedagogue with decades of teaching experience. From 1982–1989, alongside and after her violin studies, she taught violin, viola, and music education in Gross-Gerau and Rüsselsheim. She has led vocal masterclasses for the Mahler and Wagner Societies in London, music universities in Frankfurt, Mainz, and Cologne, the St. Goar Music Academy, and at the Bayreuth Festival. She has taught at the Darmstadt Academy of Music, Anton Bruckner Private University, Trossingen, and Frankfurt University of Music. Her focus includes vocal technique, repertoire, interpretation, and career planning. She created *PetraLangKlang®*, integrating Peter Hess® sound methods into vocal masterclasses.