Benjamin Appl, baritone
Photo by Lars Borges
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MANAGEMENT (NORTH AMERICAN CONCERT BOOKINGS)
Christina Jensen, christina@jensenartists.com
Gina Meola, gina@jensenartists.com
646.536.7864
“the way he navigated the song’s transformation, from disappointment to obsession, was so gripping and troublingly real, I heard people all around me exhale afterward, as if Mr. Appl had rendered them breathless.”
Baritone Benjamin Appl is celebrated for a voice that “belongs to the last of the old great masters of song” with “an almost infinite range of colours” (Suddeutsche Zeitung), and for performances “delivered with wit, intelligence and sophistication” (Gramophone). A former BBC New Generation Artist (2014-16), Wigmore Hall Emerging Artist and ECHO Rising Star (2015-16), Benjamin was also awarded Gramophone Award Young Artist of the Year (2016). He signed exclusively to Sony Classical in the same year and has since begun a multi-album deal with Alpha Classics, releasing his first album Winterreise in February 2021 to enormous critical acclaim.
Appl’s musical journey began as a young chorister at the renowned Regensburger Domspatzen, later continuing his studies at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater München and the Guildhall School of Music & Drama in London. Mentored by the legendary Artist Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Appl describes the partnership as an “invaluable and a hugely formative influence. He [Fischer-Dieskau] is an inspiration – someone who is always searching and seeking a deeper understanding of music and of life. He was a role model for how to prosper as an artist, never just delivering, but each time creating.”
An established recitalist, Appl has performed at Ravinia, Rheingau, Schleswig Holstein, Edinburgh, Heidelberg Frühling, and Oxford International festivals; Schubertiade Schwarzenberg; and at the KlavierFestival Ruhr. He has performed at major concert venues including Grand Théâtre de Genève, Festspielhaus Baden-Baden, Wigmore Hall London, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Konzerthaus Berlin and Vienna, Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Musée de Louvre Paris, and at Shanghai Symphony’s Music in the Summer Air Festival.
In equal demand as soloist on the world’s most prestigious stages, his recent collaborators include the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra/Klaus Mäkelä, Munich Philharmonic/Andrew Manze, Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse/Ton Koopman, Budapest Festival Orchestra, Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra/Andreas Reize, NHK Symphony Orchestra/Paavo Järvi, Philadelphia Orchestra/Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Staatskapelle Dresden/Christian Thielemann, Philharmonia/Maxim Emelyanychev, Seattle Symphony/Thomas Dausgaard, Vienna Symphony/Karina Canellakis and many others.
Some of Appl’s recent recital debuts include Carnegie Hall, San Francisco Performances, Dallas Opera, Boston Celebrity Series, New York’s Park Avenue Armory (of all three Schubert song cycles), Sydney Opera House, Mozarteum Salzburg, Festival St. Denis, and three presentations of Winterreise by the Gran Teatre del Liceu Barcelona. A creative and innovative programmer, Benjamin seeks out diverse and enriching onstage partnerships including with pianists James Baillieu, David Fray, Alice Sara Ott, Arthur & Lucas Jussen, and Jorge Viladoms; the Armida String Quartet; accordionists Martynas Levickis and Ksenija Sidorova; and lutenist Thomas Dunford.
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Operatic highlights of recent seasons include his role and house debut as Harlequin Ariadne auf Naxos at Liceu Barcelona; Papageno Die Zauberflöte at Opéra de Rouen; and his role debut as Guglielmo Cosí fan tutte with Classical Opera Company (a role which he revisited last season at Mozartfest Würzburg). In the 2024/25 season, Appl looks forward to making his operatic house debut at Hamburg State Opera as Papageno and in concert forges artistic partnerships with Oslo Philharmonic Klaus Mäkelä, NFM Wroclaw, Le Concert Spirituel/Hervé Niquet, and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic (both as baritone soloist and in his European conducting debut).
A revered interpreter of early music, Benjamin enjoys regular collaborations with Les Talens Lyriques, the Gabetta Ensemble, B’Rock, Ensemble Masques, and the Berliner Barocksolisten. Equally at home in new music, Benjamin has premiered compositions by Nico Muhly, David Lang, and Matthias Pintscher, as well as enjoying a significant long-term partnership with composer György Kurtág.
Appl’s growing discography includes his latest album for Alpha Classics entitled The Christmas Album (released in Winter 2024), which includes a beautiful selection of European Christmas songs recorded with his former boys’ choir the Regensburger Domspatzen and regular artistic partner, the Müncher Rundfunkorchester. Appl’s other albums recent albums include Forbidden Fruit, about which BBC Music magazine writes “The sheer breadth and ingenuity of the programming is, well… irresistible”; an album of orchestrated Schubert lieder with Münchner Rundfunkorchester; a collection of Hans Sommer Orchestral Songs with Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin; an album of Schumann duets with Ann Murray (DBE), accompanied by Malcolm Martineau; and a live recording of Schubert lieder with Graham Johnson for the Wigmore Hall Live label. His first solo album for Sony Classical, Heimat, was Gramophone nominated and won the prestigious Prix Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (Best Lieder Singer) at the 2017-18 Académie du Disque Lyrique Orphées d’Or. Other recent recordings include an album of Bach with Concerto Köln as well as Sibelius’s Kullervo with the BBC Scottish Symphony and Thomas Dausgaard for Hyperion Records.
Outside the concert hall, Appl recently appeared in a new realisation of Schubert’s song cycle Winterreise which was filmed in the Swiss Alps. Commissioned by the BBC and Swiss television station SRF, and directed by John Bridcut, the film offers a unique and insightful interpretation of Schubert’s epic work and was broadcast on BBC4 in 2022. In addition, he recently presented a series of programmes for BBC Radio 3 entitled A Singer’s World and starred in the film Breaking Music, which celebrates both Argentinian Tango and German Lied traditions by breaking down traditional boundaries between musical genres.
“Appl is not only a singer of boundless promise, he is already a great artist. This disc shows how versatile he is, with not only great Lieder but interesting rarities too…Appl sounds as if singing is his most natural mode of expression; and since he has an extraordinary beautiful voice, there should be decades of happiness as he continues to expand his repertoire.”
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“The voice has a burnished, oaky beauty as well as considerable sweetness, while the interpretations are suffused with a gentle intelligence, an instinct for unforced but direct communication and what feels like a real love for the repertoire.”