Jochen Kupfer, bass-baritone

Jochen Kupfer is one of Germany’s most sought-after singers. His guest appearances in the world’s opera houses
and concert halls have been internationally celebrated.
In addition to his engagements at the Semperoper Dresden and the Staatstheater Nürnberg guest appearances have taken Jochen Kupfer to the opera houses in Tokyo, Beijing, Strasbourg, Zürich and to the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, to the Vienna Volksoper, the opera house and styriarte Graz as well as to Staatsoper Hamburg, Komische Oper Berlin, Oper Leipzig, Staatsoper Unter den Linden in Berlin and Bayerische Staatsoper München.
In the 2021/22 season, Jochen Kupfer returns to the Bayerische Staatsoper and to the Munich Opera Festival in the new production of Penderecki’s Die Teufel von Loudon under the musical direction of Vladimir Jurowski. Other new productions in the current season are Salome (Jochanaan, Landestheater Innsbruck) and Der Rosenkavalier (Faninal, Staatstheater Nürnberg).
Highly acclaimed role debuts in preceding seasons included Duke Bluebeard (Bartók, Duke Bluebeard’s Castle), Wozzeck in Berg’s opera of the same name, Andrej Bolkonski (Prokofiev, War and Peace), Gunther (Götterdämmerung), Mandryka (Arabella), Kurwenal (Tristan und Isolde), Orest (Elektra), the broom-maker (Hänsel und Gretel), the Bad Guys (The Tales of Hoffmann), Escamillo (Carmen), the title role in Rossini’s Guillaume Tell, Giorgio Germont (La Traviata) and Pizarro (Fidelio).
Upcoming role debuts will be Barak (R. Strauss, Die Frau ohne Schatten) and Amfortas (Wagner, Parsifal).
Jochen Kupfer’s debut at the Glyndebourne Opera Festival 2016 as Beckmesser was acclaimed as “Beckmesser sings
gloriously…” (Daily Express).
He has given recitals and concert performances throughout Europe, in Japan, Mexico, Brazil, Hong Kong, Israel and the United States and at international festivals as well.
His repertoire includes Johann Sebastian Bach’s passions and Haydn’s Schöpfung as well as the romantic oratorios, Orff’s Carmina burana and also the famous Lied cycles and Lieder from the late romantic period up to classical modernism.
In 2018 his scenic Lied recital WANDERER had its premiere at Staatstheater Nürnberg.
Jochen Kupfer has appeared with famous conductors including Giuseppe Sinopoli, Kurt Masur, Riccardo Chailly, Krzysztof Urbanski, Dirk Kaftan, Constantin Trinks, Raphael Frühbeck de Burgos, René Jacobs, Philippe Herreweghe, Jeffrey Tate, Enoch zu Guttenberg, Christof Prick, Kent Nagano, Fabio Luisi, Yuri Temirkanov, Paavo Järvi, Sir Roger Norrington and Herbert Blomstedt.
In 2020 the first CD of the three-part Hans Sommer Lied Edition (Naxos) was released, the second CD will follow in 2022. Other first-rate recordings such as Schubert’s Winterreise (CD, MeisterKlang) and Wagner’s Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (DVD, Coviello) are added to his numerous recordings in the recital and concert repertoire.
In 2016 Jochen Kupfer has been awarded the honorary title Bayerischer Kammersänger. Since 2019 he has been professor for singing at Hochschule für Musik Würzburg.
When he was only nine years old, he got his first singing lessons at the music school of his native town of Grimma. He studied with Helga Forner (Musikhochschule Leipzig) and attended master classes with Theo Adam, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf and Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, completing his studies with Rudolf Piernay, Harald Stamm and Dale Fundling.

Alexander Fleischer, pianist

Alexander Fleischer was awarded prizes at international competitions early on, including the Lied accompanist prize at “Das Lied” International Song Competition Berlin 2009. He has performed at the Lucerne Festival, Musikverein Vienna, Festspielhaus Baden-Baden, Philharmonie Cologne, Music Festival “Heidelberger Frühling,” Konzerthaus Berlin, festspillene i bergen, Festival RheinVokal, and the Hugo-Wolf-Akademie Stuttgart, among others.
He works with singers such as Bo Skovhus, Roman Trekel, Thomas Quasthoff, Tobias Berndt, Manuel Walser, Nikola Hillebrand, Jochen Kupfer, Andreas Wolf, Daniela Sindram, and others.
Alexander Fleischer holds a guest lectureship at the Hanns Eisler School of Music Berlin and has been working as assistant to KS Prof. Thomas Quasthoff since 2011.
In April 2015 he became a teaching position for Lied interpretation at the Würzburg University of Music. In 2017 he was a lecturer at the renowned Britten Pears Festival in Aldeburgh (UK).
In 2017 he founded his own song festival. The “Hirschberger Liedfest” takes place for the 5th time in 2021.
His highly-praised CD with Goethe settings by Fanny Hensel with baritone Tobias Berndt was released on the querstand label. In 2020 the CD “Legacy” with Catalan-Spanish repertoire was released together with mezzo-soprano Anna Alàs i Jové on SEED MUSIC.