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The German mezzo-soprano, Christa Mayer, graduated from the Bavarian Academy of Singing. She pursued further studies at the Munich Academy of Music, where she was a pupil of tenor Thomas Moser, gaining her masterclass diploma in 2001. She won several notable singing competitions, including prizes in the ARD International Music Competition in Munich and the International Robert Schumann Contest for Pianists and Singers in Zwickau (2nd Prize, 2000).
Upon completing her education in 2001, Christa Mayer joined the Semperoper in Dresden. At that opera house she has performed in roles such as: Erda in Der Ring des Nibelungen, Fenena in Nabucco, Suzuki in Madama Butterfly, Adelaide in Arabella, and Mistress Quickly in Falstaff. She portrayed the role of Schwertleite in Die Walküre at the Berlin State Opera and has also made appearances at the Deutsche Oper Berlin. She has performed at many international festivals including Rheingau Musik Festival, Schleswig-Holstein and Bad Kissingen festivals as well as Schubertiade at Schwarzenberg. She is particularly known for her portrayal of Erda in Richard Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen; a role which she has performed several times (2008, 2009) at the Bayreuth Festival and recorded on the BBC Legends Record Label.
In 2001, Christa Mayer sang in the premiere of Rudi Spring's Heimkunft, his Chamber Symphony No. 3, after Friedrich Hölderlin in Tettnang. She performed Gustav Mahler's Kindertotenlieder at the Septembre Musical in Montreux, Switzerland in 2004. At the Bavarian State Opera she has been heard as Schwertleite in Die Walküre. In 2007, on the request of Zubin Mehta, she sang Erda and Schwertleite in Die Walküre at the newly built Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía in Valencia. She also performed Maddalena in Verdi's Rigoletto in Dresden in 2008, along with Diana Damrau and Juan Diego Florez. Also in Dresden, she sand in 2009 Cornelia in Guilio Cesare in Egitto by George Frideric Handel, and in 2010 Gaea in Daphne by R. Strauss. Her recent roles have been Ottavia in L'incoronazione di Poppea and Gaea in Daphne. She sang as a guest at the InterHarmony International Music Festival in Sulzbach-Rosenberg, Bavaria with Cellist Misha Quint in 2010.
Recordings: Erda/Waltraute in Götterdämmerung/Der Ring des Nibelungen by Wagner (2008, CD Opus Arte); Erda in Rheingold/Schwerleite in Der Ring des Nibelungen by Wagner (2007, DVD Unitel); Maddalena in Rigoletto by Verdi (2008, DVD Virgin). |
