Top Songs By Christa Ludwig
More albums from Christa Ludwig
ALBUMStrauss, R.: CapriccioKarl Schmitt-Walter, Hans Hotter, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Nicolai Gedda, Rudolf Christ, Dennis Wicks, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Philharmonia Orchestra, Raymond Leppard, Christa Ludwig, Dermot Troy, Eberhard Wächter, Manoug Parikian, Anna Moffo, Edgar Fleet, Raymond Clark, David Winnard, Edward Darling, Lesley Fyson, Geoffrey Walls, John Hauxwell & Ian Humphries
ALBUMWagner, R.: Walkure (Die) [Opera] (Karajan) (1958)Hans Hotter, Birgit Nilsson, Ludwig Suthaus, Herbert von Karajan, Orchestra del Teatro alla Scala di Milano, Christa Ludwig, Jean Madeira, Lotte Rysanek, Gerda Scheyrer, Margareta Sjoestedt, Martha Rohs, Rosette Anday, Hilde Rössel-Majdan, Leonie Rysanek, Milan Teatro alla Scala Chorus, Judith Hellwig & Gottlob Frick
ALBUMStrauss, R.: Rosenkavalier (Der) [Opera] (Schwarzkopf, Ludwig, Edelmann, Karajan) (1956)Otto Edelmann, Erich Majkut, Gerhard Unger, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Nicolai Gedda, Anny Felbermayer, Harald Proglhof, Franz Bierbach, Ljuba Welitsch, Kerstin Meyer, Loughton High School for Girls Choir, Bancroft's School Choir, Philharmonia Chorus, Herbert von Karajan, Paul Kuen, Philharmonia Orchestra, Teresa Stich-Randall, Christa Ludwig, Eberhard Wächter & Karl Friedrich
About Christa Ludwig
Artist Biography
Christa Ludwig ranked among the elite in a golden era of postwar singing that, with hindsight, seems more glamorous than anything we’ve known since. And she wasn’t just admired but adored—with an intensity that grew through a career of almost half a century. Born in 1928 in Berlin, she started young, making her debut as an 18-year-old Orlofsky in Die Fledermaus (1874) in Frankfurt, where she learned her craft during the early 1950s. But from there, her homebase shifted to Vienna, with regular visits to Salzburg and the New York Met, where she sang cross-dressed "trouser" roles—Cherubino in The Marriage of Figaro (1786), Octavian in Der Rosenkavalier (1911)—with legendary casts under conductor Erich Leinsdorf. Essentially a mezzo, she encompassed dramatic soprano heights as Leonore in Fidelio (1805) and the Marschallin in Rosenkavalier, without losing the creamily voluptuous velvet sound that, combined with big projection and a sense of fun, made her a go-to singer for conductors like Böhm, Karajan and Bernstein. In more intimate repertoire, German song became a speciality—few women have attempted Schubert’s Winterreise, let alone delivered it with such emotional authority. Another was Bach, with Ludwig singing the Passions and B minor Mass alongside starry names like Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and her husband Walter Berry (with whom she often shared a stage). Her death in 2021, aged 93, brought to an end one of the truly great careers of 20th-century singing.
Hometown
Berlin, Germany
Genre
Classical
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