Rebekka Bigelmayr (Mezzo-soprano)

Born: 1990 - Munich, Bavaria, Germany

The German mezzo-soprano, Rebekka Bigelmayr, studied with Eeva Tenkanen, Alexis Wagner and Gerhild Romberger at the Hochschule für Musik Detmold (Artistic bachelor degree in opera/concert: 2017; Master's degree in vocal pedagogy: 2020). She has been studying New Music with Professor Angelika Luz at the Stuttgart University of Music since March 2020. Her most important teachers are Susanne Winter from Munich (since 2010) and Dorothea Geipel from Detmold (2012-2020). They had a decisive influence on her artistic work. Before her studies, after an external dance training at the Royal Academy of Dance/London (1994-2012), she first learned the American voice training method "Linklater" from the film actress Nicola Tiggeler (2009-2012). Master-classes with Margreet Honig and Sibylla Rubens as well as intensive work with Christiane Iven at the Salzburg Summer Academy, the Ettal Music Academy and private lessons gave further impulses. During her studies she was a scholarship holder of the Society of Friends and Sponsors of the Detmold University of Music for several years. She was a semi-finalist at the Federal Singing Competition 2018 at the Berlin University of the Arts.

Rebekka Bigelmayr was particularly captivated by the piece Sequenza III (1966) by Luciano Berio, which she expanded with the dancer Marie Nüzel and staged as a post-war work. In 2018 she won the competition "Musik & Vermittlung" in Detmold. At the beginning of her singing career she was awarded the special prize for contemporary music for the first time for the "Berio-Sequenza" in the context of the competition "Jugend musiziert". Invitations from Bayerischer Rundfunk to Nuremberg and the All Saints' Court Church of the Munich Residence followed. In 2017 she was again honoured with a special prize with the Scottish pianist Christopher Harding at the Interpretation Competition of the Detmold University of Music for her outstanding engagement with New Music.

Rebekka Bigelmayr was last heard with the Göttingen Symphony Orchestra and the Northwest German Philharmonic Orchestra in the alto part of Franz von Suppé's Requiem. She made her debut at the Landestheater Detmold in 2019 in the role of Paoluccia in Niccolò Piccini's La buona figliuola conducted by Ivan Törzs. At the 2019 Fontante Festival near Berlin, she played the role of Cécile of St. Arnaud as an actress and singer. Frank Matthus was the director under whom she also made her debut in 2018 at the Kammeroper Schloss Rheinsberg (with guest performance in Estonia) in the world premiere A Bad Man`s Life by Marc-Aurel Floros under the direction of Andrei Diakov. At the Theater Bielefeld she could be heard in 2016 with the Stabat Mater by Giovanni Battista Pergolesi. Further roles on stage were excerpts from Samuel Barber's Vanessa as Erika, Benjamin Britten's Albert Herring as Nancy and Igor Stravinsky's The Rake´s Progress as Baba. In spring 2017 she conceived her own production. She put together the secular solo cantata O numi eterni - Lucrezia by George Frideric Handel with basso continuo accompaniment as a complex one-hour performance with solo singing, contemporary dance and electroacoustics. Texts written by the singer herself gave the piece that special something, both from tape and spoken live.

Rebekka Bigelmayr also regularly performs in concerts. Special treasures such as Maurice Duruflé's Requiem, Joseph Haydn's Stabat Mater and G.B. Pergolesi`s enrich her repertoire. In addition there are all W.A. Mozart masses as well as the oratorios and passions of J.S. Bach. With a love for less well-known works, she participated under the direction of Peter Kreutz in the world premiere at Theater Gütersloh and the CD production at CPO of Carl Reinecke's Wild Swans. She sang several world premieres of song cycles composed especially for her by the young composer Max-Lukas Hundelshausen. As a performance artist she was a guest at the Pasinger Fabrik in Munich and the Museum am Dom in Würzburg.

For the winter semester 2019-2020 Rebekka Bigelmayr held a teaching position for singing at the Hochschule für Musik Detmold.

Sources:
Rebekka Bigelmayr Website & Facebook profile
Photos 002, 267, 345, 434, 459, 472, 496, 564, 616, 635: Gerd Pfeiffer
Contributed by Aryeh Oron (November 2022)

Recordings of Bach Cantatas & Other Vocal Works

Conductor

As

Works

Kay Johannsen

Alto

[V-3] (2021, Video): BWV 231

Links to other Sites

Rebekka Bigelmayr - Mezzosoprano, Coaching (Official Website) [English/German]
Rebekka Bigelmayr on Facebook