In the poetry of Wilhelm Müller, Schubert found the ideal source for his songwriting. This concert presents the first fruits of this affiliation: the sublime song cycle Die schöne Müllerin of 1823. We should beware of thinking that the cycle is simply a pretty, pastoral love story with an unhappy ending. Schubert intended it to be much more than that: an almost mythical expression of the Romantic idea that true love cannot be realized on earth, but can only find its consummation in death. Wagner would later embrace this theme in Tristan und Isolde, but here, Schubert embodies it with music of more modest dimensions but at least equal profundity.
Since his sensational debut at New York’s Metropolitan Opera in La traviata in 2006, Jonas Kaufmann has numbered among the top stars on the operatic horizon. Insiders praise him as the most important German tenor since Fritz Wunderlich.
Mr. Kaufmann comes from Munich, where he completed his vocal studies at the Music Academy. He began his career at the opera houses of Saarbrücken and Stuttgart, and later became a member of the Zürich Opera. He now performs at the world’s leading opera houses, including the Paris Opera, La Scala, Vienna State Opera, Bayerische Staatsoper, and Royal Opera House, Covent Garden.
As much in demand for Italian and French repertoire as he is for German opera, Mr. Kaufmann’s intense characterizations of Don José in Bizet’s Carmen and the title role in Massenet’s Werther took opera fans by storm. Past performances in New York and London, and his highly acclaimed Puccini recital at La Scala, were broadcast in cinemas worldwide, as was his long-awaited role debut as Otello in Verdi’s opera of the same name at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, in June 2017.
Mr. Kaufmann’s versatility is documented on a number of CDs and DVDs in performances of such works as Pagliacci, Cavalleria rusticana, Don Carlo, La forza del destino, Aida, Otello, Tosca, Adriana Lecouvreur, Werther, Carmen, Lohengrin, Die Walküre, Parsifal, Königskinder, and Ariadne auf Naxos. His solo albums are bestsellers only a few weeks after being released; his album Du bist die Welt für mich—which features classic popular tunes of the German Golden Era—even appeared on the pop charts. He has been selected as singer of the year several times by classical music magazines Opernwelt, The Diapason, and Musical America, and by the juries of ECHO Klassik and the inaugural International Opera Awards (London 2013).
Mr. Kaufmann is also a familiar figure worldwide on the concert and recital stage. His partnership with pianist Helmut Deutsch, with whom he worked as far back as his student days in Munich, has proven itself in countless concerts, including his 2011 recital at the Metropolitan Opera; it was the first solo recital given at the Met since Luciano Pavarotti’s in 1994.
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