Christian Immler

Bass-Baritone

Biography

With a voice of “warm, noble timbre and great flexibility” (Forum Opéra), German bass-baritone Christian Immler is a multifaceted artist whose career ranges widely across the worlds of lieder, oratorio and opera, “a technically, musically and stylistically consummate interpreter, with exemplary diction and emotional urgency coupled with a deep intellectual textual understanding” (Klassik Heute). He studied with Rudolf Piernay in London and won the International Nadia et Lili Boulanger Competition in Paris.

His operatic experience ranges from Monteverdi’s Seneca, Jupiter in Rameau’s Castor et Pollux, the Commendatore and Masetto in Don Giovanni, Speaker in Die Zauberflöte, Don Fernando and Rocco in Beethoven’s Leonore, the Hermit in Weber’s Der Freischütz, the Musiklehrer in Strauss’ Ariadne auf Naxos to Unsuk Chin’s Alice in Wonderland. In concert, he has performed Mahler’s Symphony No.8 with the Minnesota Orchestra, Kindertotenlieder with Hungarian National Philharmonic, Mendelsohn’s Elias with the OAE, Zemlinsky’s Lyric Symphony with Orchestre National de France, Detlev Glanert’s Prager Symphonie with the Czech Philharmonic, Missa solemnis with the Montreal Symphony as well as the Requiems of Dvorak, Brahms, Mozart, Fauré and Verdi. Naturally, he loves coming back to key works by Bach and Handel. Christian has worked with such conductors as Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Herbert Blomstedt, René Jacobs, Semyon Bychkov, Marc Minkowski, Masaaki Suzuki, Raphaël Pichon, Ivor Bolton, Christophe Rousset, Daniel Harding, Kent Nagano, Leonardo Alarcón, Laurence Equilbey, Philippe Herreweghe and William Christie.

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Reviews

“Immler put bite into both his sung and spoken lines, adding an occasional flourish like a subtle echo effect [and] also did heroic work imbuing disjointed, impressionistic lyrics with powerful emotional expression.”

Frank Kuznik

Bachtrack

“Baritone soloist Christian Immler has a natural presence, expressive with balance. His rich, powerful, sometimes deep voice easily radiates into the hall. His long, yet precise phrasing is enhanced by a very pleasantly careful diction.”

Original text:

“Le baryton soliste Christian Immler fait preuve d’une présence naturelle, expressive avec équilibre. Sa voix riche et puissante, parfois profonde, rayonne aisément dans la salle. Ses phrasés longs et néanmoins précis sont rehaussés par une diction très agréablement soignée.”

Emmanuel Deroeux

Ôlyrix, November 2022

“From the beginning, Christian Immler is thrilling as the Hermit. The sonorous quality of his bass radiates a dignified calm and the beauty and evenness of his voices encapsulates the spiritual grandeur of the Christian admonisher.”

Online Merker, April 2022

Press Reviews

“Dominating the whole work, Christian Immler is Saul, whom he lives with singular intensity. Everything is there for this perilous role, where the king, imbued with his power, jealous, angry, calculating, dark in a murderous madness: voice sound in all registers, well stamped, projected at will. His dramatic commitment is exemplary.”

Original text:

“Dominant tout l’ouvrage, Christian Immler est Saül, qu’il vit avec une intensité singulière. Tout est là pour ce rôle périlleux, où le roi, imbu de son pouvoir, jaloux, rageur, calculateur, sombre dans une folie meurtrière : voix sonore dans tous les registres, bien timbrée, projetée à souhait. Son engagement dramatique est exemplaire. Qu’attend un producteur pour le mettre en scène?”

Albert Dacheux, Classiquenews, July 2019

“Christian Immler was an appropriately omniscient mystic who also boomed the voice of Samiel over spectral amplification in the bullet-forging scene. “Er oder du” could have been Verdi’s Grand Inquisiteur. Bringing hermetic wisdom to determine Max’s fate, “Wer legt auf ihn so strengen Bann?” had dramatic gravitas with a resonant low B-flat. The Sarastro-like “Leicht kann des Frommen Herz” monologue had a Talvela-ish low A-natural and the fortissimo “Wer höb’ den ersten Stein wohl auf?” was redolent of Jim Bakker televangelist hectoring.”

Jonathan Sutherland, Operawire, May 2019

Matching him was the bass Christian Immler (who I last saw in March as Hermit/Voice of Samiel in the Insula Der Freischütz in Aix), superbly strong in the ‘Tuba mirum’

Seenandheard, Colin Clarke, June 2019

The baritone Christian Immler shows himself in this varied programme to be a technically, musically and stylistically consummate interpreter. In the familiar Schubert and Brahms cycles, he has no need to hide behind any previous great artist. His voice is strikingly masculine, bass-grounded yet capable of tenoral splendour, the diction is exemplary, one can indeed understand every word. Emotional urgency is coupled with a deep intellectual understanding of the text.

Original text:

Der Bariton Christian Immler zeigt sich in diesem vielseitigen Programm als ein in technischer, musikalischer und stilistischer Hinsicht mit allen Wassern gewaschener Interpret. In den bekannten Zyklen von Schubert und Brahms braucht er sich hinter den bedeutendsten Künstlern der Vergangenheit nicht zu verstecken. Die Stimme ist männlich markant, bassig geerdet und zu tenoralem Glanz fähig, die Diktion ist mustergültig, man versteht tatsächlich jedes Wort. Emotionale Dringlichkeit verbindet sich mit intellektueller Durchdringung der Textinhalte.

Klassik heute, Ekkehard Pluta, April 2019