Rebecca Nelsen

Soprano Rebecca Nelsen, a native of Texas, has celebrated important debuts this past year at the Sächsische Staatsoper Dresden as Sophie (Der Rosenkavalier), Blonde (Entfühung aus dem Serail), Susanna (Le Nozze di Figaro), Violetta (La Traviata—new production with Fabio Luisi) and Adele (Die Fledermaus). Another notable debut was at Teatro La Fenice in Venice as Violetta in the Robert Carsen production of Verdi's La Traviata last September. She also starred in the Vienna Volksoper’s highly-acclaimed premiere of Künneke's Vetter aus Dingsda as Julia de Weert last season and sang the revival in April 2010.

A member of the ensemble at Staatstheater Braunschweig from 2007-2009, Ms. Nelsen appeared in many roles including Blonde in Mozart’s Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Tochter in Cardillac, Musetta in La bohème, Gilda in Verdi's Rigoletto, Sophie in Strauss’ Der Rosenkavalier, Ippolito in J.S. Mayr’s Fedra (recorded and commercially released on the Oehms Classics label), Stasi in the operetta Csardasfürstin, and Euralia in Haydn’s Orlando Paladino.

Ms. Nelsen has given numerous solo concerts in Austria, Germany, Italy, Poland and the United States and has a wide repertoire that includes opera, oratorio, lied, operetta, musicals and jazz.

She has sung the soprano solos in Fauré’s Requiem, Handel’s Messiah, Bach’s Johannes Passion, Haydn’s Die Schöpfung, Schubert’s Mass in E-flat Major, Mozart’s Mass in C minor, Vivaldi’s Gloria, Orff’s Carmina Burana, Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis and Brahms’s Deutsches Requiem.

Ms. Nelsen studied voice at Texas Tech University and won a Fulbright Scholarship in 2003 to study at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna, Austria. Her European debut took place with John Casken’s God’s Liar at the Vienna Klangbogen Festival in 2004. In 2005, she celebrated critically acclaimed premiers as Eurydice in Orfeo by Monteverdi/Chech with the Neue Oper Wien and as Flora in the Klangbogen production of Michael Tippett’s The Knot Garden.

In 2006, Ms. Nelsen sang Pamina in Thomas Pernes’ Zauberflöte ‘06 for the Vienna Mozart Year as well as Gretl in Erik Hoksgaard’s Don Juan kommt aus dem Krieg with the Neue Oper Wien and the Angel/Larissa in Richard Dünser’s Radek at the Bregenzer Festspiele. She also sang Fiordiligi in Mozart’s Cosi fan tutte in Vienna in cooperation with the Vienna Mozart Year.

In August, Ms. Nelsen will record songs by Walter Arlen which will be released on the Gramola label. In 2010-2011, she also will be heard in the Bernstein Mass with the Neue Oper Wien as part of the OsterKlang Festival in Vienna, as Marzellina in Fidelio under the baton of Gustav Kuhn, and as Gretel in Humperdinck’s Hänsel und Gretel with the Vienna Volksoper.