Opera Scotland

Claudio Nicolai Suggest updates

Claus Henneke.

Born Kiel, 7 March 1929.

Died La Palma, 11 May 2020.

German baritone.

Claudio Nicolai studied in Vienna, initially as a tenor, making his debut, under his changed name, in Munich in 1954.  He soon retrained as a baritone.

Nicolai began a contract at the Cologne Opera in 1964 as Guglielmo.  From then until retirement in 1989 he gave 1066 performances there.  The role he performed most often was Papageno.

In Britain he appeared at the 1980 Edinburgh Festival as a member of the Cologne ensemble.

Nicolai worked at La Scala Milan, New York Met, Zurich, and Berlin. He also appeared at the Salzburg Festval.

(Data mainly from obituary in Opera, August 2020).