Ann Hallenberg

Soprano Ann Hallenberg has established a strong career as an operatic and recital musician. Early roles in works by Luigi Rossi and Donizetti forecast the range of her repertoire. With a specialty in Baroque music, she has also performed music forward into the modern era. A frequent guest at opera houses and festivals throughout Europe, she has also performed with orchestras in North America. Hallenberg has established a fruitful relationship with conductor Ian Page and the Mozartists, who backed her on the 2025 album Gluck Arias. Hallenberg was born in Sweden in 1967. She began her singing life in a choir as a youth and started voice lessons when she was 14. She attended Stockholm's Royal College of Music, graduating in 1994 after studies with Erik Sædén and Kerstin Meyer. She went on for further studies with Joy Mammen in London. Hallenberg's U.S. debut came in the American presentation of Björn Hallman's opera Solitaire in the mid-'90s; a recording of that performance constituted her first appearance on record when it was issued in 1994 by the OttoGram label. Juxtaposed with that contemporary work, other early roles in such works as Il fortunato inganno by Donizetti and Orfeo by Luigi Rossi, displayed her versatility from the beginning of her career. Her concert performances have been equally diverse, taking in works by Brahms, Beethoven, and Mahler, among others. Hallenberg has performed in many of the major Romantic era roles, notably in works by Rossini and in the titular character in Bizet's Carmen, but much of her focus has been on mezzo and castrato roles from the Baroque era, especially since stepping in as a last-minute substitute for Cecilia Bartoli in a 2003 Zurich Opera production of Handel's Il trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno. Hallenberg has taken a considerable interest in the famed castrato Farinelli (Carlo Broschi), teaming with Les Talens Lyriques and conductor Christophe Rousset on the acclaimed album Farinelli, a live program recorded in 2011. Those forces also teamed up in 2014 for the touring program "Arias for Farinelli." Hallenberg has worked with many leading early music conductors, including Fabio Biondi, William Christie, and John Eliot Gardiner, among others. Another fruitful partnership for Hallenberg has been with the ensemble the Mozartists and conductor Ian Page. Among their collaborations was a 2023 program of Handel arias at Wigmore Hall. These forces combined again for the 2025 album Gluck Arias. ~ Keith Finke, Rovi