Karl-Heinz Lehner

Austrian-born Karl-Heinz Lehner sang as a soprano and alto soloist with the choirboys at the Benedictine monastery of Altenburg Abbey while he was still at grammar school. After graduating from high school, he studied singing at the Vienna University of Music and Performing Arts with Leopold Spitzer and song and oratorio with Kammersängerin Edith Mathis. Karl-Heinz Lehner received his first permanent engagement at the Stadttheater Bremerhaven. After two seasons, he moved to the Dortmund Opera House, where he was able to develop a large repertoire, and then to the Aalto Theater Essen.
In 2016 and 2017, the artist made his debut at the Bayreuth Festival as Fafner in ‘Das Rheingold’ and ‘Siegfried’, Titurel in ‘Parsifal’ and Nachtwächter in ‘Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg’. He has also made guest appearances at the Hamburg State Opera, the Bavarian State Opera, the Semperoper Dresden, the Graz Opera House, the Komische Oper Berlin, the Volksoper Vienna, the Leipzig Opera, the Teatro dell'Opera in Rome and the Bregenz Festival. At the same time, Lehner was a member of the ensemble at the Dortmund Opera, where he sang roles such as Baron Ochs, King Marke, Sarastro in ‘The Magic Flute’, Mephistophélès in ‘Faust’, the Commendatore in ‘Don Giovanni’, Zaccharia in ‘Nabucco’ and Ramfis in ‘Aida’. In 2018–19, he made guest appearances at Nuremberg Opera as King Heinrich in Lohengrin, at Cologne Opera as Rocco, and at Leipzig Opera as Landgrave (Tannhäuser) and Baron Ochs. Karl-Heinz Lehner has worked with renowned conductors such as George Prêtre, Phillipe Jordan, Ulf Schirmer, Leopold Hager, Jac van Steen, Stefan Soltesz, Axel Kober, Gabriel Feltz, as well as with directors Mariame Clément, Claus Guth, Jens Daniel Herzog, Stefan Herheim, Anselm Weber and Richard Jones. In addition to his opera work, Karl-Heinz Lehner is also a sought-after concert singer. He has sung at the Wiener Konzerthaus, the Musikverein Wien, the Salzburg Festival, the Konzerthaus Dortmund and the Philharmonie Essen, among others. In 2018, he sang the bass part in Mahler's 8th Symphony, including a CD production with the Dortmund Philharmonic Orchestra (Gabriel Feltz). In the 2019.20 season, Karl-Heinz Lehner could be heard as King Marke (‘Tristan und Isolde’) at the Cologne Opera, as Baron Ochs (‘Der Rosenkavalier’) at the Wiesbaden State Theatre and as Rocco (‘Fidelio’) at the Bonn Opera.
In the 2019.20 season, he was engaged in the ensemble of the Aalto-Theater Essen. There he could be heard in the title role of Bartók's ‘Duke Bluebeard's Castle’, as Sparafucile (‘Rigoletto’), Grand Inquisitor (‘Don Carlo’) and Count Lamoral (‘Arabella’) as well as in the title role in the Offenbach operetta ‘Auf Ihr Wohl, Herr Blumenkohl!’ In 2022–23 he joined the ensemble at Cologne Opera, where he sang Daland in Der fliegende Holländer and the Ghost Messenger in Die Frau ohne Schatten.