ABOUT
PORTRAITS
PORTRAITS
ABOUT
Opera News calls her “a natural actress…with thrilling, laser-like focus” and “luminous tone.” Opera magazine praises her “stunningly rich mezzo.” With a career that takes her throughout the U.S. and Europe, the “powerhouse” mezzo-soprano Katharine Goeldner is recognized as one of today’s finest artists.
Katharine’s performances in 2019 and 2020 included her role debut as a “deliciously slippery,” “snake-like” Annina in Der Rosenkavalier at The Metropolitan Opera, directed by Robert Carsen and conducted by Sir Simon Rattle; an exciting last-minute performance as the Marquise de Berkenfeld in Laurent Pelly’s production of La fille du Regiment, also at the Met, and costarring Kathleen Turner, Pretty Yende, and Javier Camarena and conducted by Enrique Mazzola; a “powerful and velvety” Fricka in Die Walküre in Augsburg; Verdi’s Requiem with the Jacksonville Symphony; and Brigitta in Die tote Stadt in Toulouse and with RTÉ Dublin. Critics have described Katharine’s performances as Ma Joad in Ricky Ian Gordon and Michael Korie’s The Grapes of Wrath as “consistently stunning” and “a perfect marriage of artist and role.” She created the roles of both Jackie Onassis in David T. Little and Royce Vavrek’s JFK and Peggy Ophuls in Jack Perla’s Shalimar the Clown. She brings her “marvelous” Marcellina in Le nozze di Figaro back to the Lyric Opera of Chicago in spring 2021.
Katharine’s impressive international career has taken her to the stages of Toulouse, Lyon, Seville, Bilbao, Hannover, Kassel, Monte Carlo, Montreal, Santa Fe, Arizona, Dallas, Paris’ Châtelet, the Salzburg Festival, and the Savonlinna Festival, spanning the mezzo repertoire from the Composer in Strauss Ariadne auf Naxos, one of her signature roles, to more recent portrayals of Amneris, Dalila, Herodias, and Brangäne. Her many roles at the Metropolitan Opera have included the Schoolboy in Lulu (the role of her company debut), Cherubino in Le nozze di Figaro, Ascanio in Benvenuto Cellini, Nicklausse in Les contes d’Hoffmann, Prince Orlofsky in Die Fledermaus and Jane Seymour in Anna Bolena opposite Anna Netrebko in the title role. She has starred as Carmen at Finland’s Savonlinna Festival, Lyric Opera of Chicago, the Dorset Festival (UK), Madison Opera, and New York City Opera.
Katharine’s vast concert repertoire includes Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde with the Royal Ballet at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden and on tour at Lincoln Center; Shostakovich's Songs from Jewish Folk Poetry
with Leon Botstein and The Orchestra Now at Carnegie Hall; a DVD of K.A. Hartmann’s Erste Sinfonie with Lothar Zagrosek and the Bavarian Radio Orchestra; Salome in concert with Edo de Waart at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam; Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony with Georges Prêtre and the Vienna Symphony; Mahler’s Symphony No. 3 with Timothy Hankewich and Orchestra Iowa; and multiple performances with RSO-Vienna, Berlin Symphony, Filarmonica Toscanini, Real Filharmonia de Galicia, Prague Radio Symphony, Orchestre Philharmonie de Radio France, and the Basel Sinfonietta, with such distinguished conductors as Sir Charles Mackerras, Hans Graf, Dennis Russell Davies, Michael Schønwandt, Jesus Lopez-Cobos, Marek Janowski, and Adam Fischer.
Passionate about classical art song, Katharine has presented recitals at the Kennedy Center, the Salzburg Mozart Festival, Vienna’s Festival Ravel, the Théâtre du Capitole Toulouse, Drake University, and her alma mater, the University of Iowa. As a member of the chamber trio The Prairie Song Project, she has commissioned two works for mezzo, flute and piano: Peter Ash’s Paradox and Rory Boyle’s A Handful of Leaves.
Katharine received her Bachelor of Music Education from the University of Iowa. She was extremely honored to be named an Alumni Fellow by the University’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences in 2012. She also holds a Magister Diplom/Masters Degree with High Honors in Lieder and Oratorio from Salzburg’s Mozarteum University. Katharine shares her passion for vocal education by maintaining a private studio and presenting master classes for such distinguished institutions as the University of Iowa, Abilene Christian University, The University of Wisconsin at Stevens Point, Florida International University, Drake University, the University of Northern Iowa, Florida International University, the AIMS institute in Graz, and the University of Miami Summer in Salzburg program.
Updated: May 2020
Katharine Goeldner enthralled us with her expressive mezzo-soprano and her masterful interpretation of Brangäne.
With her performance this evening, the doors of all the great opera houses of the world should be open to her.
Der neue Merker, Harald Lacina
REPERTOIRE
OPERA
*indicates role in preparation
Adams
Marilyn Klinghoffer The Death of Klinghoffer
Berg
Geschwitz Lulu
Berlioz
Didon Les Troyens
Ascanio Benvenuto Cellini
Bizet
Carmen Carmen
Britten
Hippolyta A Midsummer Night's Dream
Mrs.Grose The Turn of the Screw
Debussy
Geneviève Pélleas et Mélisande
Donizetti
Marquise of Berkenfield La fille du Regiment
Giovanna Seymour Anna Bolena
Maffio Orsini Lucrezia Borgia
Gilbert and Sullivan
Pitti Sing The Mikado
Gluck
Orfeo Orfeo ed Euridice
Gordon, Ricky Ian
Ma Joad The Grapes of Wrath
Janáček
Kostelnička* Jenůfa
Korngold, Erich
Brigitta Die tote Stadt
Little, David T.
Jacqueline Onassis JFK
Mascagni
Santuzza Cavalleria rusticana
Mozart
Marcellina Le nozze di Figaro
Sesto La clemenza di Tito
Dorabella Cosi fan tutte
Cherubino Le nozze di Figaro
Offenbach
Nicklausse/Giulietta* Les contes d'Hoffmann
Perla, Jack
Peggy Ophuls Shalimar the Clown
Poulenc
Mère Marie Dialogues des Carmélites
Puccini
Suzuki Madama Butterly
La Zia Principessa Suor Angelica
Saints-Saëns
Dalila Samson et Dalila
Smythe, Ethel
Thirza The Wreckers
Strauss, J.
Prince Orlofsky Die Fledermaus
Strauss, R.
Annina Der Rosenkavalier
Composer Ariadne auf Naxos
Octavian Der Rosenkavalier
Herodias Salome
Tchaikovsky
Madame Larina Eugene Onegin
Thomas
Gertrude Hamlet
Verdi
Amneris Aida
Dame Quickly* Falstaff
Wagner
Fricka Das Rheingold
Fricka Die Walküre
Waltraute Götterdämmerung
Brangäne Tristan und Isolde
CONCERT
Bach
St. John Passion
St. Matthew Passion
B minor Mass
Beethoven
Ninth Symphony
Berio
Folk Songs
Berlioz
Les nuits d'été
Roméo et Juliette
Bernstein
Songfest
Brahms
Alto Rhapsody
Liebesliederwalzer
Bruckner
Mass in F minor
Te Deum
Ninth Symphony
Chausson
Poème de l'amour et de la mer
Danielpour
Portraits
Duruflé
Requiem
Eisler
Deutsche Sinfonie
Furrer, Beat
Poemas
Die Blinden
Epilog
Händel
The Messiah
Hartmann, K.A.
Erste Sinfonie, "Versuch eines Requiems"
Haydn, J.
Paukenmesse
I ritorno di Tobia
Mahler
Das Lied von der Erde
Symphony Nr. 2
Symphony Nr. 3
Symphony Nr. 8
Marx, J.
Verklärtes Jahr
Mendelssohn
Elijah
Die Erste Walpurgisnacht
Milhaud
Machines agricoles
Mozart
Concert Arias:
Chi sá, chi sá, qual sia (KV 582)
Al desio di chi t’adora (KV 577)
Ch’io mi scordi di te? (KV 505)
Vado, ma dove? (KV 583)
Coronation Mass
Requiem
Ravel
Shéhérazade
Schoenberg
Pierrot lunaire
Schubert
Mass in Ab Major
Mass in Eb Major
Schumann
Das Paradies und die Peri
Shostakovich
Songs from Jewish Folk Poetry
Spohr
Die letzen Dinge
Verdi
Requiem
Wagner
Wesendonck Lieder