Sebastian Kohlhepp VitaEnglisch_August2016.indd

Sebastian Kohlhepp
Biography
German lyric tenor Sebastian Kohlhepp is in great demand on the international opera and concert scene. He is
currently a member of the resident company of Stuttgart Staatsoper, where in the course of the next season he will
cover the roles of Oronte (Handel Alcina), Don Ottavio (Mozart Don Giovanni) and Ferrando (Mozart Così fan tutte),
among others. The audience and the critics hailed his Stuttgart début in early 2015, in the role of Lucio Vero in Niccolò
Jommelli’s Late Baroque opera Il Vologeso - Berenice, Queen of Armenia, in a staging by Jossi Wieler and Sergio
Morabito that the “Opernwelt” magazine critics’ poll selected as the opera rediscovery of the year.
Sebastian Kohlhepp was born in Limburg an der Lahn, where he also received his first vocal training at the local
boys’ choir. He studied under Hedwig Fassbender at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Frankfurt/Main.
He was then engaged as a member of the opera ensemble at Karlsruhe Staatstheater. For the 2013/2014 season he
switched to the Staatsoper in Vienna, where he sang under the baton of renowned conductors such as Adám Fischer,
Peter Schneider, Jeffrey Tate and Franz Welser-Möst.
Kohlhepp has given guest appearances at Opéra Monte Carlo, Theater an der Wien, Vienna Volksoper and Basel
Municipal Theatre. Further invitations have led him to perform at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Philharmonie
in Berlin, the Philharmonie in Paris, Zurich Tonhalle, Vienna Konzerthaus, Shanghai Concert Hall and the Teatro
Colón in Buenos Aires.
In the area of oratorios and early music, Kohlhepp collaborates on a regular basis with the ensemble of Stuttgart Bach
Academy, with the Collegium Vocale Gent, with RIAS Kammerchor, the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin and Freiburg
Baroque Orchestra.
Upcoming projects include Bach’s St John Passion with the Belgian baroque orchestra B’Rock in Wroclaw (under
Andreas Spering) as well as with the Gürzenich Orchestra at Cologne Philharmonie (François-Xaver Roth); further
concerts and CD productions will feature Bach’s Christmas Oratorio with the Gaechinger Cantorey (Hans-Christoph
Rademann) and Beethoven’s 9th Symphony with the Orchestre des Champs-Elysées conducted by Philippe Herreweghe
in Shanghai.
Kohlhepp’s multitalented engagements can be admired in a series of CD, DVD and broadcast recordings. Most recently
he was featured on the harmonia mundi CD production of the St John Passion conducted by René Jacobs. He is also
participating in the complete recording of Bach’s Chorale Cantatas with Christoph Spering and the Musikforum Köln.
(2016/2017 season. Please only use this approved biography; no alteration or abridgement without the approval of the
artist.)