Werner Güra

Werner Güra © Marco Borggreve

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BIOGRAPHY

German tenor Werner Güra, born in Munich, received his musical training at the Mozarteum in Salzburg and completed his vocal studies with Professor Kurt Widmer. Furthermore, he was coached by Nicolai Gedda, Professor Margreet Honig in Amsterdam and Professor Wessela Zlateva in Vienna.

After guesting at the opera houses of Frankfurt and Basel, he joined the ensemble of the Semperoper Dresden in 1995, where he sang the important Mozart and Rossini parts of his Fach. Daniel Barenboim invited Werner Güra for various productions at the Staatsoper Berlin. He continued as guest in Dresden and also sang his highly acclaimed Mozart roles Tamino, Ferrando and Don Ottavio at Teatro Carlo Felice in Genova, Opéra de Lille, La Monnaie in Brussels and the Opéra National de Paris, at the Innsbruck Festival of Early Music and in Baden-Baden. 2014 celebrated a great success at the Zürich Opera with a new production (Willy Decker) of Il Ritorno d'Ulisse in patria.

At this stage of his career, Werner Güra concentrates his activities on the vocal-symphonic and Oratorio repertoire. He sang on the most prestigious European concert stages such as Konzerthaus and Musikverein Wien, Royal Festival Hall London, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Philharmonie Berlin, Philharmonie Paris and worked with many orchestras including Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, Wiener Symphoniker, BBC Symphony Orchestra, the German, Dutch, Spanish, Danish Radio Symphony Orchestras, the Gulbenkian Orchestra Lisbon, with conductors such as Claudio Abbado, Riccardo Chailly, Michel Corboz, Sir Colin Davis, Adam Fischer, Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Bernard Haitink, Leopold Hager, Daniel Harding, Thomas Hengelbrock, Pablo Heras-Casado, René Jacobs, Marek Janowski, Philippe Jordan, Ton Koopman, Fabio Luisi, Kurt Masur, Ingo Metzmacher, Riccardo Muti, John Nelson, Andris Nelsons, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Sir Roger Norrington, Trevor Pinnock, George Prêtre, Peter Schreier, Thomas Zehetmair. Werner Güra enjoyed close collaboration with Nikolaus Harnoncourt under whose baton he appeared at the Vienna Musikverein, Styriarte Festival, Philharmonie München, Concertgebouw Amsterdam and on tour in Japan.

Recent Highlights include Britten’s War Requiem with the Vienna Symphony and Philippe Jordan, Bach’s Magnificat with Concentus Musicus Wien and Stefan Gottfried, followed by Schumann’s Paradies und die Peri with Jérémy Rohrer and Schumann’s Faust-Szenen with the Royal Concertgebouw Orkest under Sir John Eliot Gardiner in Amsterdam, Beethovens IX. Symphonie under Yannick Nézét-Séguin in Baden-Baden, as well as with the Gewandhausorchester under Andris Nelsons in Leipzig and Mendelssohn’s Lobgesangs-Symphonie with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra under Sir John Eliot Gardiner in Berlin.

In the current season, Werner Güra is performing Haydn's Creation together with the Concertgebouw Orkest conducted by Philippe Herreweghe, as well as Schumann's Das Paradies und die Peri with the Gewandhausorchester, Haydn's Seasons with the Tonkünstlerorchester Niederösterreich under Ivor Bolton, Mendelssohn's Lobgesangs-Symphony with the Accademia di Santa Cecilia under Kazuki Yamada, Bach's B minor Mass with Yannick Nézét-Séguin in Montréal, Beethoven's IX. Symphony with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France in Paris, Mendelssohn's Paulus with the Concentus Musicus and Stefan Gottfried at the Vienna Musikverein, with the Gewandhaus Orchestra under Andris Nelsons in Leipzig and the Tonkünstlerorchester Niederösterreich under Fabien Gabel in Grafenegg, with Bach's St. John Passion with René Jacobs in Amsterdam, Haydn's Creation under Sylvain Cambreling in Hamburg and Mendelssohn's Walpurgis Night under the baton of Pablo Heras-Casado in Stuttgart.

Werner Güra is also much appreciated as Lied interpreter, regularly giving recitals amongst others at the Wigmore Hall London, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Vienna’s Musikverein and Konzerthaus, Lincoln Center New York, the Philharmonie in Cologne and the Schubertiades Schwarzenberg and Barcelona.

About 50 recordings document the versatility of the artist. In autumn 2000, Schubert’s Die Schöne Müllerin was released as Werner Güra’s first solo recording on Harmonia Mundi, followed by Schumann’s Dichterliebe and Liederkreis op. 39 as well as Hugo Wolf’s Mörike Lieder, all with pianist Jan Schultsz. Latest releases on Harmonia Mundi with pianist Christoph Berner are Schöne Wiege meiner Leiden, featuring songs by Clara & Robert Schumann and Johannes Brahms as well as Schubert’s Schwanengesang, Winterreise and Mozart Lieder. All these solo recordings received the ‘Diapason d’or’ and were elected Editor’s Choice in Gramophone Magazine. For his Winterreise, Werner Güra received the BBC Music Magazine Award in the category ‘Vocal’ in 2011. For his latest Schubert-CD Willkommen und Abschied, he was awarded the prestigious German ECHO-Klassik prize in 2012. His latest recording features Beethoven Lieder and Bagatellen. In April 2021 Hugo Wolf’s “Italienisches Liederbuch” together with Anke Vondung and Christoph Berner has been released by the label Spektral.

Werner Güra has been teaching at the Zurich University of the Arts since 2009.

2022 | 2023

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DISCOGRAPHY

Johann Sebastian Bach: Johannes-Passion BWV 245
Werner Güra, Sophie Gallagher, Aleksandra Lewandowska, Alex Potter, Maximilian Vogler, Drew Santini
Gli Angeli Geneve
Stephan MacLeod
Conductor: Stephan MacLeod
Label: Claves | 2023

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WERNER GÜRA looks forward to fascinating concert projects

WERNER GÜRA performs in Barcelona, Cologne and Geneva

BEETHOVEN'S IX. SYMPHONY - new release by Harmonia Mundi