German soprano Anja Strauss has been equally acclaimed for her opera performances and for her appearances on the concert stage. Last seasonıs highlights included performances in New York City, among them the Eurydice in Orphée aux Enfers by Offenbach at the Juilliard Opera Theater and a recital in Weill Hall at Carnegie. During this current season she has performed Mozartıs Requiem for the September 11 Commemoration at Lincoln Center in New York, and she will appear in a Bach program at San Franciscoıs Palace of the Legion of Honor as a part of the Avedis Chamber Music Series.
Her operatic roles have included Gretel in Humperdinck's Hänsel und Gretel, Miss Wordsworth in Brittenıs Albert Herring, Lauretta in Puccini's Gianni Schicchi, Barbarina in Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro and Elpinice in Ipermestra by Gluck and Hasse.
Ms. Strauss has worked with such renowned German orchestras as the Hamburg Symphony, the Kiel Philharmonic and the Schleswig-Holstein Symphony. She was the featured guest artist at the Millennium New Yearıs Eve Gala of the Mozart Orchestra Hamburg. Other recent appearances include a song recital in Lübeck, Germany, and a Gala Concert at the Teatro Bramante Urbania in Italy.
In addition to operas and concert works, Ms. Strauss has performed a vast repertoire of sacred music, ranging from Bach and Vivaldi to Respighi and Lili Boulanger. She has toured Germany, Poland, Italy and Slovenia, singing the solo parts of the German Requiem by Brahms, Bachıs B Minor Mass, Mozartıs Requiem and C Minor Mass and The Seasons by Joseph Haydn. After September 11, 2001 she performed at a Memorial Service at the German Church in New York, attended by German President Rau and Foreign Minister Fischer.
At the invitation of renowned singer Bernd Weikl, Ms. Strauss sang at the Music Festival Bodenmais as well as at the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival, the Judenburg Summer Festival (Austria) and the Olympic Music Festival (Seattle), where she will perform again this upcoming season. She has recorded the Petite Messe Solennelle by Rossini under her maiden name Anja Burmeister for the label Dabringhaus und Grimm.
Ms. Strauss has studied with Professor Günter Binge in Lübeck, Germany, and has been chosen to sing at the Master classes of Christa Ludwig, Ubbaldo Fabbri, Elly Ameling and Barbara Bonney. She graduated from the Juilliard School in New York in May 2002 where she studied with Cynthia Hoffmann. This coming season she will make her Sacramento Opera debut, singing the role of Clorinda in Rossiniıs Cenerentola.
