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Prof. Errico Fresis

short vita

Errico Fresis, formerly Deputy General Music Director at the Freiburg Theatre, was appointed 2003 Professor and Musical Director of the Vocal Department at the Berlin University of the Arts.

He began his career as a vocal coach (Solorepetitor) at the Vienna State Opera and the Vienna Volksoper, and also served as Assistant Director of the Opera Studio at the Vienna State Opera. This was followed by engagements as Kapellmeister at the Ulm Opera and subsequently as Kapellmeister and Head of Music at the Saarbrücken State Opera.

He attracted particular international attention with his production of Tri Sestri (Three Sisters) by Peter Eötvös at the Freiburg Theatre. The composer attended the performance in person and subsequently invited Fresis to conduct the work with the BBC Symphony Orchestra at the 2001 Edinburgh International Festival, where the production was named “Best of the Year.”

Errico Fresis continues to make a significant contribution to contemporary opera, with a particular commitment to the rediscovery of rarely performed works. His projects include Kopernikus by Claude Vivier (German premiere in 2008; revived in 2019 at the Berlin State Opera), Melusine by Aribert Reimann, Les trois souhaits by Bohuslav Martinů, Arlecchino by Ferruccio Busoni, Limonen aus Sizilien by Manfred Trojahn, Staatstheater by Mauricio Kagel, A Game of Fives (five world premieres of operas at the Munich Biennale), Fra i due litiganti il terzo gode by Giuseppe Sarti, Don Giovanni by Giuseppe Gazzaniga, and Scenes from Mozart’s Life by Albert Lortzing. He has also conducted concerts featuring works by composers including Morton Feldman, Alban Berg, Luigi Nono, Matthias Spahlinger, John Cage, and Hans Wüthrich.

He has maintained a long-standing collaboration with ensemble recherche, appearing at the Hannover Biennale, the Hitzacker Chamber Music Days, the Bludenz Days of New Music, the Istituzione Universitaria dei Concerti in Rome, the Stuttgart State Opera (Forum for New Music Theatre), and within the Saarbrücken Radio Symphony’s “Music in the 21st Century” series. Concerts, recordings, and guest appearances have taken him to leading venues including the Berlin State Opera, the Alte Oper Frankfurt, the Teatro Massimo Bellini in Catania, the National Theatre Mannheim, the Stuttgart State Opera, the Nuremberg State Theatre, the German National Theatre Weimar, the Graz Opera, the Athens State Opera, and the Thessaloniki State Opera. He has also collaborated with ensembles and orchestras such as Klangforum Wien, the Saarland Radio Symphony Orchestra, the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the Freiburg Philharmonic, the Thessaloniki State Orchestra, the Greek National Radio Orchestra, and the Athens State Orchestra.

He is fluent in English, French, German, Italian, Hebrew, and Greek.