Elisabeth Wilke

Elisabeth Wilke is a native of Dresden and studied at the Carl Maria von Weber Conservatory in that city. She made her debut in the role of Hansel at the Dresden State Opera, now the Semper Opera, while still a student and after graduating became a permanent member of that venerable establishment’s ensemble.Her wide-ranging opera repertoire consists mainly of lyrical mezzo- soprano and contralto roles such as Dorabella, Cherubino, Octavian, Rosina, Xerxes and Poulenc’s Human Voice. Being very much in demand as a soloist for orchestral concerts and oratorios, she has collaborated closely with a number of conductors and orchestras of renown, as well as with the Kreuzchor of Dresden and St. Thomas’s Choir of Leipzig.Elisabeth Wilke has given lieder recitals and chamber music concerts at a number of major festivals such as the Ansbacher Bachwoche, the Schleswig Holstein Festival, the Dresden Music Festival, the Bach Festival Leipzig, Berlin Music Festival and the Liturgica Festival Jerusalem. Having been accorded the title of Kammersängerin as well as the City of Halle’s Handel Prize, Elisabeth Wilke is now an honorary professor at the Academy of Music in Dresden and since October 2000 has held a professorship at the Mozarteum in Salzburg as well. Thanks to her countless concert engagements both in Germany and abroad as well as a number of radio and television broadcasts and CD recordings, Elisabeth Wilke’s fame as a singer has long since spread far beyond Germany’s borders.