Christoph Strehl

Tenor Christoph Strehl was born in Lübeck, where he first became acquainted with musical repertoire from Schütz to Distler as a boy soprano with the Lübecker Sing- und Spielkreis. He completed his vocal studies with Soto Papoulkas at the Folkwang Academy in Essen, in addition to taking part in master classes with Norman Shetler and Josef Metternich. He made his stage debut while continuing his education at the Kammeroper Schloss Rheinsberg. Following initial engagements at Mannheim’s National Theater, where above all he learned the Mozart repertoire, Strehl joined the Zurich Opera ensemble in 2002. Invitations to the Munich, Dresden, Hamburg, and Berlin Staatsoper houses ensued, as well as to the National Opera of Paris, the Teatro Malibran in Venice, and the Salzburg Festival. Since 2003 Christoph Strehl has performed at the latter as Mozart’s Don Ottavio, Belmonte, and Ferrando. Singing the role of Tamino, he made his debut at the Metropolitan Opera in New York in December 2006, at the Vienna Staatsoper in 2007, and at the London Royal Opera House in January 2008. Christoph Strehl has partnered with such conductors as Claudio Abbado, William Christie, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Marc Minkowski, and Franz Welser-Möst; he has been influenced as a performer above all by the directors Jürgen Flimm, Claus Guth, Stefan Herheim, Martin Kušej, Nikolaus Lehnhoff, and Christof Loy. His concert appearances have taken him to the Schubert Festival in Vorarlberg, the Styriarte Festival in Graz, and the Vienna Festwochen, as well as to Munich, Madrid, and Cleveland. Christoph Strehl sings on Claudio Abbado’s recording of Die Zauberflöte and can be seen on DVD in productions of Rameau’s Les Indes galantes, Wagner’s Die Meistersinger and Beethoven’s Fidelio recorded live at Zurich Opera.

Christoph Strehl makes his LUCERNE FESTIVAL debut with this concert.

May 2010