December 2007

Diana Damrau

Sunday, December 02, 2007

Metropolitan Opera superstar soprano Diana Damrau sang the final “Queen of the Night” role in Mozart’s The Magic Flute of her career – a role that requires the kind of vocal gymnastics few singers can manage. Damrau is today’s reigning Queen. She tells host Gilbert Kaplan why at such a young age of 36 she made this decision, why opera singers sometimes fall in love with their stage partners, why singers should stage a revolution against opera directors who distort the composer’s intentions, the music she listens to for consolation at times of sadness or “love-pain,” which sopranos have most influenced her and about her just-released and already acclaimed recording of arias by Mozart and Salieri, “Arie di bravura.”