Background
Siegfried Jerusalem was born at Oberhausen, and studied piano, violin and bassoon at the Folkwangschule in Essen.
singer university professor opera singer
Siegfried Jerusalem was born at Oberhausen, and studied piano, violin and bassoon at the Folkwangschule in Essen.
Violin and piano at Folkwang Hochschule, Essen. Voice and started singing career in Zigeunerbaron 1975.
Closely identified with the heldentenor roles of Wagner, he has performed Siegfried, Siegmund, Lohengrin, Parsifal, and Tristan to wide acclaim. Since the 1990s, he has focused on lieder, particularly those by Strauss, Mahler and Schumann. He began his career as bassoonist, being engaged in Hof in 1961 and for the next ten years in Reutlingen: from 1971-1977, he was attached to the Radio Symphony Orchestra of the South-German Radio in Stuttgart.
In 1971, he also began taking voice lessons with Hertha Kalcher of Stuttgart.
In 1975, when due to perform in the orchestra of a television production of Der Zigeunerbaron, he stood in for the tenor Franco Bonisolli at the last minute. Thenceforth Jerusalem made singing his career.
His first major role was Lohengrin in 1976, a role in which he soon appeared at Darmstadt, Aachen, Hamburg, and at the Zurich Festival, and later in Munich and the New York Metropolitan He followed this with Max in Der Freischütz at Stuttgart.
His Bayreuth career opened in 1977, where by 1981 he had performed Froh (Das Rheingold), the Young Sailor (Tristan und Isolde) and then Lohengrin, Parsifal and Walter von Stolzing (Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg).
His Parsifal was also heard in Vienna at that time, and his Siegmund (Die Walküre) (with Jessye Norman, Theo Adam and Yvonne Minton) in Dresden (1981). In addition to stage appearances he gave various concert performances which, like the Dresden Walküre or the Rome Lohengrin were broadcast internationally. His Bayreuth career continued with Siegfried in 1988 (Siegfried) and 1989 (Götterdämmerung).
In 1990, he appeared at the Metropolitan Opera with James Levine, singing both Siegfrieds, as well as the difficult role of Loge.
The production was televised, and is available on Digital Video Disc. In 1992, his Bayreuth-Siegfried was made as a Digital Video Disc again. On this performance, Jerusalem was singing with Graham Clark, Anne Evans and John Tomlinson, and 1993 he debuted as Tristan at the Bayreuth Festival, and took the role to most of the major houses in Europe.
From 1978, he became a regular member of the German Opera in Berlin, and had permanent contract with the companies in Stuttgart, Zürich, Munich, and Vienna as well as making international guest appearances.