Petra Lang belongs to the most renowned Wagner singers of today. She sang Isolde in Bayreuth, Munich and Vienna and was Brünnhilde in the Ring Cycles at the Semperoper Dresden under Christian Thielemann, at the Vienna State Opera under Peter Schneider and at the Grand Théâtre de Genève under Ingo Metzmacher's baton. She interpreted Brünnhilde also in Bamberg, Berlin, Budapest, Bucharest, Dortmund, Lucerne, Munich, Paris, Stuttgart and Tokyo.

A quote after her appearance in "Götterdämmerung" at the Semperoper Dresden, Januar 2018 testifies the excellence of her performance and her vocal skills :

"Petra Lang als Brünnhilde wird hier zur Sensation. […] keine Kollegin singt die Brünnhilde derzeit in allen Registern derart kultiviert, textverständlich und glutvoll in der Mittellage.“
(Concerti, Kirsten Liese, 22. Januar 2018)

Also her legendary Ortrud earned worldwide recognition. Starting off as a lyric mezzo, she was quickly recognized for her interpretation of Judith (Bluebeard’s Castle), Cassandre (Les Troyens), Ariadne (Ariadne auf Naxos), Marie (Wozzeck) as well as her Wagner roles of Brangäne, Sieglinde, Venus, Kundry, Waltraute and Fricka.

Petra Lang sang at the major houses on both sides of the Atlantic and appeared at the festivals in Salzburg, Bregenz, Edinburgh and Bayreuth (Brangäne, Ortrud and Isolde).

Her Cassandre on the live recording of Les Troyens under Sir Colin Davis and with the London Symphony Orchestra won her two Grammy Awards, a BRIT Award, the Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik as well as the Orphées d’Or de L’Academie du Disque.

Recent highlights

Recent highlights have included signature parts as Isolde at the Bayreuth Festival and Brünnhilde in Dieter Dorn's Ring (Wagner) under Georg Fritzsch at Geneva's Grand Théâtre, as in Seoul in director Achim Freyer's production. In concert, Petra Lang performed upon invitation of the Austrian Radio Orchestra, a remarkable Lied cycle by Alexander Zemlinsky after Poems of Maurice Maeterlinck. Numerous projects - amongst others Brünnhilde at the Bayreuth Festival - had to be cancelled, due to the protective measures against covid 19.

News !

Next season (2020/2021) Petra Lang will guest at the Semperoper Dresden, where she will appear under Christian Thielemann's baton in Siegfried and Götterdämmerung. Amongst her noteworthy concert productions we'd like to highlight the invitation by the Philharmonic Orchestra of Strasbourg to perform Mahler's Rückert-Lieder under Klaus Peter Flor. In the longer term the artist will expand her operatic repertoire with roles such as Kostelnicka (Jenufa), Klytämnestra (Elektra) and Herodias (Salome).

A soft spot for Mahler

notwithstanding her multiple opera engagements, Petra Lang has steadily built up her concert repertoire. She's equally at home in singing Bach as in creating works by contemporary composers and has a special connection to the works by Gustav Mahler of whom she recorded the symphonies N° 2 and N° 3 under Riccardo Chailly with the Concertgebouw Orchestrafor DECCA.

Being a complete singer she was offered repeatedly opportunities to sing under the baton of renowned conductors such as Gerd Albrecht, Claudio Abbado, Pierre Boulez, Semyon Bychkov, Riccardo Chailly, Myung-Whun Chung, Andrew Davis, Colin Davis, Ivan Fischer, Bernard Haitink, Armin Jordan, Fabio Luisi, Marek Janowski, Riccardo Muti, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Simon Rattle, Donald Runnicles, Jeffrey Tate, Christian Thielemann and Franz Welser-Möst.

A sensitive Lied interpreter

Furthermore she proved to be a particularly gifted and sensitive Lied singer. In this repertoire she appeared with pianists such Adrian Baianu, Malcolm Martineau, Carmen Piazzini, Maurizio Pollini, Wolfram Rieger, Charles Spencer et Einar Steen-Noekleberg at Concertgebouw Amsterdam, La Monnaie Brussels, Ghent, Semperoper Dresden, Edinburgh Festival, Victoria Hall and Grand Théâtre Geneva, Wigmore Hall and St. Lukes London, La Scala Milano, Gasteig Munich, Carnegie Hall, Danny Kaye Hall and Rockefeller University New-York and Châtelet, Louvre, Salle Pleyel in Paris.

The art of teaching

Petra Lang was born in Frankfurt am Main. After graduating as a violinist, she studied voice with Gertie Charlent and Ingrid Bjoner. She also worked on her Wagner roles with Astrid Varnay and studied with the Italian tenor Angelo Loforese. She visited master classes of Judith Beckmann, Brigitte Fassbaender, Hans Hotter, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and Peter Schreier.

Her passion for teaching was born as she studied the violin. After graduating she worked as a teacher both for Violin and Viola and taught early music education and basic musical studies at the music schools in Gross-Gerau and Rüsselsheim (1982-1989).

She gave master classes (voice) for the Mahler Society London (2006), at the Cologne University for Music (2007), in Münster (2007/2008) and London (2009, 2012). A master class for Wagner singing during the 2013 Bayreuth Festival as well as at the St. Goar Music Academy (2014/15), for the studio of the Cologne Opera and at Musikhochschule Mainz.

Based on her fundamental educational experience, it is important to her to provide young colleagues with tailored incentives and help for their professional singing with focus on voice education, register counselling, role studies, interpretation, individually and job-oriented career planning.

She invented the masterclass concept PetraLangKlang© which includes elements of the PeterHess®-Soundmassage and Mental Techniques.

cv-update : season 2020/2021