Opera Scotland

Peter-Christophe Runge Suggest updates

Born Lübeck, Schleswig-Holstein, 12 April 1933.

Died Verviers, Belgium, 25 June 2010.

German baritone.

Peter-Christophe Runge trained at the Hochschule für Musik in Hamburg.  His debut was in 1958 as Guglielmo in Flensburg.  He was under contract at Wuppertal from 1959 to 1964, and spent the rest of his career with the Deutsche Oper am Rhein (Düsseldorf), later teaching at that city's music school.

He sang at many of the major opera houses including Vienna, Munich, Berlin, Verona, Parma, Florence and Buenos Aires.  He also appeared at the Salzburg and Holland Festivals.

His debut in Britain was at the Glyndebourne Festival in 1966 as Papageno, a role he repeated in 1973.  He returned in 1967 (Amida in Cavalli's L'Ormindo), in 1969 (Pelléas) and 1982 (Pantalon L'Amour des Trois Oranges).

He first sang in Scotland with Scottish Opera in 1972 (Guglielmo).  He returned the following year as Ottone The Coronation of Poppea and as a late stand-in as Count Almaviva.

His Edinburgh Festival appearances also began in 1972 with the Düsseldorf company in leading roles in two highly contrasted UK premieres.  These were Stolzius in Zimmermann's recent Die Soldaten and Corpo in Cavalieri's early baroque Rappresentatione di Anima e di Corpo. He returned for a concert performance of Mahler's completion of Weber's Die drei Pintos in 1976.  Then in 1980 he was a late replacement with the Cologne Opera as Count Robinson in Cimarosa's Matrimonio Segreto.

In 1984 he sang at the Wexford Festival as Romualdo in a second Cimarosa piece, Le astuzie femminili.

He can be heard on CD in the Glyndebourne recording of L'Ormindo.