Biography

The young Icelandic artist Álfheiður Erla Guðmundsdóttir earned a bachelor's degree with honors and crowned her studies in 2021 with a Master of Music at the Hanns Eisler Academy of Music in Berlin.

She is a prizewinner of the International Haydn Competition and the International Perotti Singing Competition as well as has received multiple scholarships such as Britten-Pears Young Artist. Furthermore she has attended master classes with Anne Sofie von Otter, Véronique Gens, Susan Manoff, Piotr Beczała, Matthew Rose, Hartmut Höll and Emma Kirkby, among others. 

From an early age she tries to break new ground and build bridges between music and the visual artIs. In 2019, together with pianist Eleonora Pertz, she was selected by the prestigious Academy Orsay-Royaumont fostering a new generation of Lied duos. The same year she participated in the SongStudio at Carnegie Hall in a master class for young musicians led by Renée Fleming, exploring innovative approaches to classical and contemporary Lied repertoire. This was followed by an invitation to perform in the 2020 Carnegie Hall Citywide concert series with pianist Kunal Lahiry*. In 2021 she was named Singer of the Year in the contemporary and classical music category at the Icelandic Music Awards and represented her home country in the world-renowned BBC Cardiff Singer of the World 2021 competition.*

Already during her studies Álfheiður successfully worked with conductors such as Alondra de la Parra, Daníel Bjarnason and Fabio Biondi, and has made her debut at the Staatsoper Berlin in the title role of Snow White (Wolfgang Mitterer/Engelbert Humperdinck), followed by the role of  Papagena in The Magic Flute. At the BAROCKTAGE 2019 of the Staatsoper unter den Linden, she sang with the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin under the baton of Fabio Biondi in A. Scarlatti's "La Vergine Addolorata".
Furthermore, she appeared in various productions such as the short opera "Tolleranzia" by Axel Chorny (Deutsche Oper Berlin/ Tischlerei), Poppea/ L'incoronazione di Poppea (Freiraum Berlin), Hannchen/ Vetter aus Dingsda (Theater Altenburg Gera), Susanna/ Le nozze di Figaro (Uferstudios Berlin), Marzelline/Fidelio (Liszt Academy of Music, Budapest), Flaminia/ Il mondo della luna (HfM Berlin) and Poppea/ Agrippina (Radialsystem Berlin). 

In 2020 she sang Echo/ Ariadne auf Naxos * at L'Opéra National de Montpellier and debuted with the role of the Angel in the premiere at Theater Basel of Olivier Messiaens' Saint François d'Assise under Clemens Heil and directed by Benedikt von Peter. In 2021 she was invited to the Theater Dortmund for the premiere of the opera »Der Hetzer« by the Austrian composer Bernhard Lang.

Since the 21/22 season, Álfheiður Erla Guðmundsdóttir has been a permanent member of the ensemble at the Theater Basel, where she has performed, among others: in The Magic Flute and Don Carlos, in a staged version of J.S. Bach's St. Matthew Passion, Philip Glass's "Einstein on the Beach," and in a world premiere of a play-opera based on motifs from the Krabat saga.

In the 22/23 season she makes her role debut as Gilda/ Rigoletto, and she takes part in the premiere of »Persona« by the composer Anda Kryeziu based on a film by Ingmar Bergman at the Basel Gare Du Nord (Bahnhof für Neue Musik), and sings the soprano part in a staged version of Haydn's Creation under the baton of Jörg Halubek and directed by Thomas Verstraeten. At the end of May 23' the digital EP "From Afar Reworks" is released by the Deutsche Grammophon. Six contemporary composers and performers, including Álfheiður Guðmundsdóttir, take inspiration from Víkingur Ólafsson's album "From Afar" and adapt works from it. Álfheiður was inspired, among other things, by Brahms' Intermezzo.

In the 23/24 season she will take part in the Gintersdorfer/Klaßen new production of »Yopougon-Ring« at Theater Basel and a subsequent guest performance tour to Abidjan/Ivory Coast, which illuminates Wagner's Ring from a postcolonial perspective.
In autumn 2023 she will be heard in Italy in Bruneck and Brixen with the String Academy Bozen under the baton of Clau Scherrer in Beethoven's Mass in C major. She will also tour again with Philip Glass's anti-opera "Einstein on the Beach" in Paris, followed by the revival of Gilda/Rigoletto in Basel.
2024 starts no less exciting with two more premieres at the Theater Basel: Drusilla/ L'incoronazione di Poppea under the direction of Laurence Cummings and directed by Christoph Marthaler as well as the staged Mozart Requiem under Ivor Bolton and directed by Romeo Castellucci.

 
* cancelled due to COVID-19

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Artist Website

www.alfheidurerla.com

Management

General Management

Artist Manager  

Media

Images
Portrait
Foto: Hjördís Jónsdóttir

Download availablePortrait
Foto: Valgeir Einarsson

Download availableEngel in Saint Francois d'Assise - Theater Basel (mit Nathan Berg)

Foto: Ingo Hoehn
Videos
Trailer "Saint François d'Assise" (Olivier Messiaen) am Theater Basel

Palais Lichtenau Session - Claude Debussy "Apparition"
 

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Press