Jonas Kaufmann has convinced the appointment commission, consisting of Dr. Hans Peter Haselsteiner (President of the Tiroler Festspiele Erl), MMag. Brigitte Winkler-Komar (Supervisory Board Member of the Tiroler Festspiele Erl), Lotte de Beer (Director of the Volksoper, Vienna) and Dr. Bogdan Roscic (Director of the Vienna State Opera, Vienna) with his concept, his enthusiasm for the new task, his personality and his stage experience, and was proposed by them as "primus et unicus" for appointment.
The board is delighted about Jonas Kaufmann's decision to begin another career step at the Tiroler Festspiele Erl. Without any doubt, the singer like the artistic director Jonas Kaufmann will inspire both audience and artist colleagues and prove himself in both fields as an extraordinary and captivating personality - with radiance far beyond the borders.
The multiple award-winning tenor, celebrated on all major opera stages, will continue the successful development work of the past 25 years, which has established the festival's reputation as a place of artistic quality far beyond the region through the expansion of the musical spectrum and the building of a committed core of employees.
His appointment offers the best conditions for sustainable further development of the festival, its work in the region and its international radiance.
With Jonas Kaufmann, a new era of the Erl Festival will be initiated, explains State Secretary for Art and Culture Andrea Mayer. "Jonas Kaufmann's career and art can only be described in superlatives. He is a sensitive, gifted interpreter, masters an immense repertoire, across temporal and genre-specific boundaries, and cultivates a lively engagement with the works and their composers. Having won Jonas Kaufmann as the new artistic director for the Erl Festival means an extraordinary honor and reflects the festival's claim: international radiance and at the same time rooting in the region."
Mag. Andrea Mayer, State Secretary for Art and Culture
With Jonas Kaufmann, the Tiroler Festspiele Erl, but also the cultural land of Tyrol, gain an internationally known and sought-after voice. Not only as an opera singer, but also as an advocate of art and culture, Jonas Kaufmann has worked from New York via London to Milan. As artistic director of the Erl Festival, he will now help shape the cultural life in our country and continue to successfully position Erl beyond the state borders. His nomination means new momentum in and for Erl. That's why I'm delighted about Jonas Kaufmann's new function, he will certainly approach it with the same passion as his career as an outstanding opera singer of our time," congratulates Tyrol's Governor Anton Mattle.
Anton Mattle, Governor of Tyrol
I am very much looking forward to the honorable task and hope to be able to lead the Tiroler Festspiele Erl to artistic heights with a combination of Erl tradition and new focuses.
The fact that I came into contact with this music early on through one grandfather - a passionate Wagnerian - and that this federal state has grown close to my heart since childhood through the other - he spent the last 25 years of his life in Tyrol - could quite rightly be called fate. How extremely exciting to be allowed to pull the strings behind the scenes here for the first time!
Kammersänger Dr. Jonas Kaufmann
Biography of Jonas Kaufmann
Jonas Kaufmann was born in Munich in 1969. He studied singing at the Munich University of Music and Theater with Prof. Paul Kuen and Prof. Raimund Grumbach, as well as with Prof. Michael Rhodes in Zurich. He made his debut in 1994 at the Saarbrücken State Theater, where he was engaged until 2001. From 2001 to 2008 he was a member of the Zurich Opera House ensemble. Since then, Jonas Kaufmann has been a guest at all major opera houses and festivals worldwide.
His repertoire includes roles such as Don José ("Carmen"), Cavaradossi ("Tosca"), Don Carlo, Radames ("Aida"), Manrico ("Il Trovatore"), Calaf ("Turandot"), Rodolfo ("La Bohème"), Des Grieux ("Manon Lescaut"), Pinkerton ("Madama Butterfly"), Werther, Faust, Lohengrin, Parsifal, Siegmund ("Die Walküre"), Siegfried ("Götterdämmerung"), Tristan and many others.
Kaufmann is an exclusive artist at Sony Music. Many of his CDs and DVDs have been awarded international prizes such as the Gramophone Award. He has been chosen "Singer of the Year" several times, including by the editorial staff of the specialist magazine Opernwelt, the classical magazines Diapason and Musical America, as well as by the juries of the International Opera Awards and Opus Klassik (formerly Echo Klassik). In 2013 he was appointed Bavarian Kammersänger, in 2014 he received the Bambi in the Classical Music category, in 2015 the Premio Puccini, in 2016 the Federal Cross of Merit, in 2018 the Officier de l'ordre des Arts et des Lettres as well as the Bavarian Maximilian Order for Science and Art. In 2022 he was appointed Austrian Kammersänger.