Constance Heller

The mezzo soprano Constance Heller was born and grew up in the picturesque town of Laufen on Bavaria’s south-eastern border with Austria. She first appeared on stage during her school years, playing lead roles in premieres of mystery plays by Cesar Bresgen, and was thenceforth eager to pursue a singing career. After leaving school, she studied singing at the Mozarteum University of Salzburg, where she attained a Master of Arts with distinction. During her studies, she made her operatic debut in the twin roles of the Muse and Nicklausse in The Tales of Hoffmann at Giessen Municipal Theatre, followed by numerous other operatic and concert performances.

Constance Heller debuted at the Berlin State Opera in the role of Anna Kennedy in Maria Stuarda in 2006 and has performed there in the operas The Magic Flute, Faust, Elektra, The Gambler and Parsifal (with Plácido Domingo in the title role). She appeared in Moses und Aron in Tokyo during the Berlin State Opera’s tour of Japan. Constance Heller also has close ties with the Dresden Semperoper, where she performed in Faust, Elektra and Wagner’s “Ring” cycle. In recent seasons, Constance Heller has sung at venues including Teatro alla Scala in Milan, the Ruhrtriennale arts festival, the Esplanade Concert Hall in Singapore, the Festspielhaus Baden-Baden, the Philharmonie im Gasteig in Munich, the Berlin Philharmonie, the Cologne Philharmonie, the Berlin Konzerthaus, the Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts, the Municipal Theatre of Bern, the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma, the Teatro Comunale di Bologna, the Théâtre du Capitole in Toulouse, the Leipzig Opera, the Deutsche Oper Berlin, Theater Erfurt and, under a fixed contract, at the Schwerin State Theatre.

Her repertoire encompasses all the main breeches roles of the mezzo category, numerous parts in Richard Wagner’s operas, the roles of Olga, Paulina, Fenena, Ulrica, Amneris, Mignon, Dalila and Klytaemnestra as well as all the major oratorios and concert pieces. She has worked with such conductors as Jonas Alber, Alain Altinoglu, Daniel Barenboim, Michael Boder, Anthony Bramall, Johannes Debus, Asher Fisch, Claus Peter Flor, Daniel Huppert, Leo Hussain, Alexander Joel, Axel Kober, Yuri Lebedev, Kent Nagano, Julien Salemkour, Peter Schneider, Alexander Soddy, Stefan Soltesz, Christian Thielemann, Sebastian Weigle, Simone Young and Lothar Zagrosek in productions by Willy Decker, Peter Dehler, Michiel Dijkema, Dieter Dorn, Bernd Eichinger, August Everding, Barbara Frey, Nicolas Joel, Guy Joosten, Dieter Kaegi, Philipp Kochheim, Nikolaus Lehnhoff, Peter Mussbach, Georg Rootering, Dmitri Tcherniakov, Keith Warner and Karsten Wiegand.
Her discography includes recordings of the operas The Gambler (Unitel/Barenboim), Moses und Aron (EuroArts/Boder) and Elektra (Opus Arte/Thielemann) on DVD as well as Thielemann’s CD Elektra (Deutsche Grammophon).

Besides music theatre, she has performed new and rediscovered works with pianist Gerold Huber in recitals and for CD release. 2016 saw the release of her album Fahrt in die Welt (travelling the world) with songs by Edmund Nick after texts by Erich Kästner.

Discography