Elisabeth von Magnus

After studying recorder at the Vienna Conservatory, Elisabeth von Magnus began training as an actress at the Mozarteum in Salzburg. She then went on to study singing under Kammersängerin Hertha Töpper at the Opera School of the Munich Academy of Music. While still a student in Munich, she also attended classes in lieder interpretation with Paul Schilhawsky in Salzburg and worked as a freelance radio presenter for Austrian Radio, where she also had a chance to present her own radio programmes. As a recorder player, she founded the Ensemble Récréation and was a soloist in the Concentus Musicus Wien.
Her career as a singer began with her operatic debut in the part of Polly in a production of Benjamin Britten’s “Beggar’s Opera” at the Marstall Theatre in Munich. Since then, she has performed in countless concert halls and opera houses in almost every country in Europe as well as both the USA and Japan.
In addition to all the great mezzo soprano roles, Elisabeth von Magnus has also performed in all Bach’s big oratorios and has given concert performances of arias and cantatas by Mozart and Haydn and various solo works by Rossini, Berlioz, Respighi and Berg. Her discography includes recordings for Teldec and Erato with Nikolaus Harnoncourt and Ton Koopman as well as a CD of the “Suite of Romances” by Dmitri Shostakovich together with the Storioni Trio of Amsterdam.