Ludwig Suthaus

Ludwig Suthaus (December 12, 1906 – September 7, 1971) was a major German opera singer ("Heldentenor"), who was born in Cologne and died in West Berlin.

Biography

Ludwig Suthaus was a stonemason's apprentice when his singing talent was first discovered. He subsequently started his voice studies at the age of seventeen in his hometown of Cologne. His teacher, Julius Lenz, originally mistook him for a baritone, but in 1928 Suthaus debuted as a tenor in Aachen in the role of Walther von Stolzing in Richard Wagner's Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. From 1932 to 1941, he was engaged in Stuttgart, but was fired in 1942 because he would not join the Nazi party.

Suthaus subsequently got a new contract at the Berlin State Opera. After the war, in 1949, he switched from the State Opera - now based in East Berlin - to the "Städtische Oper" which was based in West Berlin, and remained a member of that company until the end of his career.

Since the end of the forties, Suthaus appeared regularly at the Vienna State Opera and as guest at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, London, La Scala, Milan, in Paris, Stuttgart, the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, in San Francisco and at Hamburg State Opera.