Wolfgang
Stefan Schwaiger

Tyrolean baritone Wolfgang Stefan Schwaiger sings the title role of Don Giovanni at Opera Ballet Vlaanderen in Antwerp and Ghent this season, in a new production by Tom Goossens conducted by Francesco Corti. At Oper Köln he can be heard as Lescaut in Puccini’s Manon Lescaut and as Conte Almaviva in Le nozze di Figaro under Andrés Orozco-Estrada, the new General Music Director. His schedule also includes Ping and the Mandarin in Puccini’s Turandot. Alongside this he devotes himself to song and concert work, an important focus of his artistic life.

A member of the Oper Köln ensemble since 2016, he has appeared there as Guglielmo (Così fan tutte), Papageno (Die Zauberflöte), Dandini (La Cenerentola), Ned Keene (Peter Grimes) and Figaro in Rossini’s Il barbiere di Siviglia, among others. Recent guest engagements took him to Opera Ballet Vlaanderen as Thoas in Iphigénie en Tauride and to Staatstheater Darmstadt as Belcore in L’elisir d’amore. He regularly gives song recitals and concerts with orchestral songs and oratorios.

Past guest engagements include Giove in Cavalli’s La Calisto at Teatro Real Madrid, Maximilian in Bernstein’s Candide at Staatsoper Hannover, Marullo in Rigoletto, Moralès in Carmen and Ravel’s Don Quichotte songs at the Bregenz Festival. At Staatstheater Darmstadt he also appeared as Figaro in Il barbiere di Siviglia.

During his time at the Oper Köln Opera Studio (2014–16) he built a broad repertoire: Count Dominik (Arabella), the title role in a children’s version of Purcell’s King Arthur, Freddy (My Fair Lady), Ping (Turandot), Schaunard (La Bohème), Hans Scholl (Die Weiße Rose), Falke (Die Fledermaus), Lescaut (Manon), Valentin (Faust) and Frank/Fritz in Korngold’s Die tote Stadt.

While still a student he gained extensive stage experience, including at the Wiener Taschenoper, Oper Graz and the Schlosstheater Schönbrunn, where he sang Conte di Almaviva, Frank and Falke as well as Don Giovanni – a role with which he also attracted attention at the Bregenz Festival Opera Studio in 2016.

Wolfgang Stefan Schwaiger has won numerous awards, including at the Brahms Competition in Pörtschach, Gradus ad Parnassum, Musica Juventutis at the Wiener Konzerthaus, 2nd prize at the International Ferruccio Tagliavini Competition; he was a finalist of the Otto Edelmann Competition, laureate of the Festival Juventus in Cambrai and winner of the Tyrolean Singers’ Prize (2018).

Born in Innsbruck in 1991, he received a varied musical education from an early age (recorder, trumpet, piano) and sang with the Wilten Boys’ Choir, where he soon performed as an alto soloist. From 2010 to 2014 he studied voice with Karlheinz Hanser at the mdw Vienna; in 2019 he completed his master’s degree in Lied and Oratorio with Florian Boesch with distinction.