Susanne Mentzer

Mezzo-soprano Susanne Mentzer sings Marcellina in Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro at HGO this spring. Earlier this season, she appeared as Jade Boucher in the Houston premiere of Heggie’s Dead Man Walking earlier this season, and appeared this year with the Houston Symphony as Concepcion in Ravel’s The Spanish Hour, in collaboration with Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music where she is a professor of voice. An alumna of the Houston Grand Opera Studio, Ms. Mentzer has sung Verdi’s Un Giorno di regno at Royal Opera, Covent Garden, Massenet’s Don Quichotte at Lyric Opera of Chicago, Melisande in Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande at L’Opera National de Paris, and Dido in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas at Chicago Opera Theater. She has performed extensively in concert and in recital at venues such as Carnegie Hall, The Kennedy Center, and Lincoln Center. Her Mahler credits include Rückertlieder, Lieder eines Fahrenden Gesellen, Des Knaben Wunderhorn, Das Lied von der Erde and Kindertotenlieder with Kurt Masur and the New York Philharmonic, the Houston Symphony Orchestra, the Aspen Music Festival and School, New York Festival of Song, and in recital with Christoph Eschenbach. The mezzo-soprano’s extensive discography includes complete recordings of Don Giovanni with Teatro alla Scala on Image Entertainment, Offenbach’s Les Contes d’Hoffmann with L’Opera National de Paris on TDK, and Richard Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos with the Metropolitan Opera on Virgin.