Rootering | Biography E

Jan-Hendrik Rootering

Jan-Hendrik Rootering appears regularily as a guest at the most important opera houses in the world - such as at the Scala di Milano, Royal Opera House Covent Garden, Opéra Basille Paris, and Chicago Lyric Opera, Vienna State opera, Semperoper Dresde and Opera houses like San Francisco, Washington, New York, Berlin and Sydney. He is guest of international Festivals like Munich opera festival, Salzburg festival, Berlin- and Vienna festivals, opera festival Oslo, Ravinia and the Schubertiade in Hohenems.
He gave his debut at the Metropolitan Opera, New York in 1986/87 in the role of Landgraf/TANNHÄUSER under the musical direction of James Levine. Since then he sang Gurnemanz, Fasolt, Daland, Gremin and Philipp at the Met.
His first engagement at the Bavarian State opera he had in 1982 as "Geisterbote"/DIE FRAU OHNE SCHATTEN. Since then he sang almost all big bass-roles of the Mozart- (Sarastro, Commendatore) and Wagner-repertoire (Pogner, Fasolt, Gurnemanz, Landgraf, Hans Sachs, Daland) and some roles of the italian repertoire as well (Fiesco/SIMONE BOCCANEGRA, Banquo/MACBETH).
In the role of Hans Sachs the artist appeared among in a new production-MEISTERSINGER at the Bavarian State Opera under the baton of Zubin Mehta, at the Opéra de Bastille Paris, the Vienna State Opera, the Nederlandse Opera Amsterdam, the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, the Semperoper Dresden and the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino.
His first Wotan he sang in the WALKÜRE of the highly regarded RING-production in STUTTGART (available on DVD); and with big success 2004 at the Vienna State opera. He had his debut as Jochanaan in 2002 at the Washington Opera and as Barak 2004 at the Bavarian State opera.

In merit of his long-standing relationship with the Bayerische Staatsoper and his artistic achievements he was awarded the honorary title of "Bayerischer Kammersänger" in 1986.

Jan-Hendrik Rootering is also a well known and prevalent concert singer. He regularly gives concerts with the Berlin- and Vienna Philharmonics, Symphony orchestra of the Bayerische Rundfunk, the Royal Concertgebouw Orkest Amsterdam, the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, Philadelphia and Cleveland Orchestra and he worked with conductors like Claudio Abbado, Leonard Bernstein, Riccardo Chailly, Sir Colin Davis, Christoph von Dohnanyi, Carlo Maria Giulini, Carlos Kleiber, James Levine, Lorin Maazel, Zubin Mehta, Wolfgang Sawallisch and Christian Thielemann.
His extensive discography includes recordings of DER FLIEGENDE HOLLAENDER, PARSIFAL, LUISA MILLER, and OEDIPUS REX (Stravinsky) with James Levine, DON GIOVANNI with Rafael Kubelik, and Riccardo Muti, respectively, Mozart Requiem under Sir Colin Davis, Haydn's Creation under Sir Neville Marriner, Beethoven's 9th Symphony under Leonard Bernstein as well as Wolfgang Sawallisch, Mahler's 8th Symphony and Schumann's Faust-Szenen with Claudio Abbado. The recording of DAS RHEINGOLD conducted by James Levine with Jan-Hendrik Rootering singing "Fasolt", won a Grammy Award. Other recordings feature Jan-Hendrik Rootering with song recitals (Songs by R. Strauss, H. Wolf, R. Schumann and the Balladen by Carl Loewe as well as Die Winterreise).
Jan-Hendrik Rootering was born near Flensburg/Germany as son of the Dutch tenor Hendrikus Rootering who became his teacher and mentor. Already during his studies in Hamburg he sang small parts at theatres including the Hamburgische Staatsoper and the "Musiktheater im Revier" in Gelsenkirchen.

2011
Contact: unger@badix.ch