Sarah Maria Sun

Soprano

Sarah Maria Sun is known as one of the foremost and most extraordinary performers in the contemporary music scene. In addition to numerous songs, operas and oratorios, her repertoire currently includes more than 2000 compositions from the 20th and 21st centuries, including more than 400 world premieres. North German Radio (NDR) has dedicated portrait concerts to her in 2012, 2016 and 2018.

Her tremendous adaptability is demonstrated on a regular basis on the music-theater stage. She has appeared at the opera houses in Zurich, Basel, Dresden, Frankfurt, Munich, Dusseldorf, Stuttgart, Mannheim, Leipzig, Strasbourg, Luxembourg, Zagreb, and the Opéra Bastille and the Opéra Comique in Paris. In summer 2021, she made her debut at the Salzburg Festival in Luigi Nono’s Intolleranza 1960 with the Wiener Philharmoniker and Ingo Metzmacher in a new staging by Jan Lauwers. She shows her skill for haunting theatrical and musical interpretation time and again in the depiction of complex female figures. In particular, the monodramas Yes I Will Yes by Dieter Schnebel (Elbphilharmonie Hamburg), Lohengrin by Salvatore Sciarrino (Salzburg Easter Festival), and Kolik and Queen of Hearts by Jannik Giger, Leo Hoffmann and Benjamin von Bebber (Gare du Nord Basel) are especially noteworthy. She was nominated as singer of the year by Opernwelt Magazine for the role of Elsa in Sciarrino’s Lohengrin in 2017 and for the role of Gwen in Philip Venables’ 4.48 Psychose (Semperoper Dresden) in 2019.

In the season 2025/26, Sarah Maria Sun will perform Amopera with the Klangforum Wien at the Transart Festival Bolzano, Jörg Widmann‘s Versuch über die Fuge with soloists of the BR Symphonieorchester at the Herkulessaal Munich, with the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra in Bamberg as well as with the NDR Radiophilharmonie in Herrenhausen and Widmann’s Friedenskantate with the Munich Chamber Orchestra at the Isarphilharmonie Munich. Further concerts are scheduled with the SIGNUM Saxophone Quartet in Italy and with Jan-Philip Schulze and Kilian Herold at the Kunstfestspiele Herrenhausen.

She regularly gives masterclasses for vocal music from the 20th and 21st centuries; for instance, at universities and conservatoires in Oslo, Harvard, Chicago, Stockholm, Zurich, Rostock, Moscow, Dresden, and Berlin. Between 2018-2022, she worked as a guest professor, tutor and lecturer at the music universities of Hannover, Graz and Lucerne. She is a professor for Contemporary Music and Open Creation at the Basel Academy of Music, Switzerland.

Sarah Maria Sun: Concerts in Switzerland

On 21 August 2025, the soprano Sarah Maria Sun will present her extraordinary recital programme Silence is Golden together with Kilian Herold (clarinet) and Jan Philip Schulze (piano) at the Festival Les Jardins Musicaux’s invitation in Cernier. It is already her third festival appearance in a row, following her successful festival debut in summer 2023.

On 22 and 24 August 2025, she will perform the revival of the staged version of Kurt Weill’s The Seven Deadly Sins in combination with György Ligeti’s Mysteries of the Macabre at Grange aux Concerts. This production in the staging of Christian Rätz has been premiered last year to great acclaim. Sarah Maria Sun sings the role of Anna 1 & 2 in Kurt Weill’s piece. The conductor Valentin Reymond will lead again the Orchestre des Jardins Musicaux. Further singers are Benoit Capt (The Father), Paul Kirby (Son 1), Stuart Patterson (Son 2) i.a..

Sarah M. Sun: Debut Deutsche Oper Berlin

On 20 June 2025, the soprano Sarah Maria Sun will make her debut at the Deutsche Oper Berlin in the world premiere of Rebecca Saunders’ Lash - Acts of Love. This opera in three acts in the libretto by Ed Atkins and Rebecca Saunders will be led by the conductor Enno Poppe and brought on stage by the Dead Centre, the set and costume designer Nina Wetzel and the video artist Sébastien Dupouey. The Orchestre of the Deutsche Oper Berlin will play in the pit, further soloists on stage are Noa Frenkel, Katja Kolm and Anna Prohaska. It is the first opera by the renown and award-winning British composer. Sarah Maria Sun has already worked together with the conductor and composer Enno Poppe intensively for many years.
Performances of Lash will also be presented on 27 June 2025 and 1, 11 and 18 July 2025.

Sarah Maria Sun in Berlin & Witten

On 11 & 13 April 2025 the soprano Sarah Maria Sun will sing songs by Kurt Weill such as It never was you, Lied des Lotterieagenten, Bilbao Song, Die Seeräuber Jenny celebrating the composer’s anniversary at the Konzerthaus Berlin under the baton of Iván Fischer. The Konzerthausorchester will furthermore play Hanns Eisler’s Suite No. 2 op. 24, Erwin Schulhoff’s Suite for Chamber Orchestra, Paul Hindemith’s Der Schwanendreher (viola: Lawrence Power) and Weill’s Suite panaméenne.

On 3 May 2025 the world premiere of Sarah Glojnarić‘s Guide to Reality will be presented at the Wittener Tage für neue Kammermusik. This headphones-concert flips the concert scenario on its head, introducing a hybrid format that blurs art forms and detaches string quartet music from its historicity. The audience experiences a diverse mix of noisy, virtuosic rhythmic textures, electronic soundscapes, podcasts, covers ranging from Nirvana to Enno Poppe and re-sampled string quartet repertoire. Sarah Maria Sun as a conférencier, guides the audience through the performance, acting as their subconscious, confidante, enemy, and past. The Kuss Quartett will perform and Paul Hauptmeier & Martin Recker will be responsible for the sound-design and Anahí Pérez for the light-design.

Opera / Music theatre:

Ali N Askin The killer in me is the killer in you my love (Hanna; WP)
Alban Berg Lulu (Lulu)
Luciano Berio Passaggio (Sequenza III)
Leonard Bernstein Candide (Cunegonde), Trouble in Tahiti (Dinah), A quiet place (Dede), West Side Story (Maria)
Nicolaus Brass Ein Sommertag (Young woman; WP)
Peter Maxwell Davis Miss Donnithorne´s Maggot (Miss Donnithorne)
Peter Eötvös Der Goldene Drache (Young Chinese)
Arnulf Herrmann Wasser (Katja; WP)
Michael Hirsch, Elena Mendoza, J.M. Sanchez-Verdù Visiones Vicciones (4 Soprano parts)
Rolf Riehm Sirenen – Bilder des Begehrens und des Vernichtens (Sirene 1/mermaid 1)
Peter Ruzicka Hölderlin (Soprano I)
José-Maria Sanchez-Verdù Aura (Aura; WP)
Dieter Schnebel Yes I will (Molly Bloom; WP), Utopien (Soprano WP)
Salvatore Sciarrino Infinito Nero (Maria Maddalena)
Thomas Stiegler Prinzessin Ulla und die Schöne Lau (Princess Ulla)
Oscar Strasnoy Geschichte (Mother)
Johann Strauß Die Fledermaus (Adele)
Richard Strauss Der Rosenkavalier (Sophie)
Igor Stravinsky The Rake´s Progress (Anne Truelove)
Kurt Weill The Seven Deadly Sins (Anna), The Threepenny Opera (Polly, Jenny)
Jörg Widmann Das Gesicht im Spiegel (Patrizia)

Concert (selection):

Georges Aperghis Septes Crimes de l’amour, Cinq couplets, Contretemps, Le rire physiologique
Luciano Berio Laborynthus, Folk-Songs, Sinfonia, Air
Pierre Boulez Pli selon Pli
Nikolaus Brass Sommertag (WP), Der Goldene Steig (WP), Stimme und Tod (WP)
Benjamin Britten Folksongs, Cabaret-Songs
John Cage Forever and sunsmell, The wonderful widow of eighteen springs
Unsuk Chin Akrostichon
Luigi Dallapiccola Divertimento
Hanns Eisler Palmström op. 5
Beat Furrer Fama
Gérard Grisey Quatre Chants pour franchir le seuil
Georg Friedrich Haas Atthis
Karl Amadeus Hartmann Friede anno 48
Hans-Werner Henze Being Beateous
Paul Hindemith Melancholie (WP), Marienleben
Heinz Holliger à plume éperdue (WP), Dämmerlicht, Increschantüm (WP), Adieu pour P.B. (UA), Grignan (WP)
Peter Kyburz still and again
Helmut Lachenmann Got Lost
Bernhard Lang Cold Trip I (WP), Songbook II (WP), Hermetica V (WP)
György Ligeti Aventures, Nouvelles Aventures, Der Sommer
Bruno Mantovani Cantata
Peter Maxwell-Davis Miss Donnithorne´s Maggot, The Telephone
Olivier Messiaen Harawi
Isabel Mundry Vogelherd (WP)
Sarah Nemtsov TOV (WP)
Luigi Nono Canti di Vita e d´amore, La Fabbrica Illuminata
Samir Odeh-Tamimi Namì
Matthias Pintscher Lieder und Schneebilder
Alberto Posadas La tentación de las sombras (WP)
Aribert Reimann Ni una sombra
Rolf Riehm Der Asra
Wolfgang Rihm Ophelia Sings
Peter Ruzicka Streichquartett VI, Mnemosyne (WP)
José-Maria Sanchez-Verdù Gramma, Atlas (WP)
Salvatore Sciarrino Due Melodie, Canto degli specchi, Lohengrin
Johannes Schöllhorn Pierrot Lunnaire, Damenstimmen, strong>, Va…
Arnold Schönberg Streichquartett II, Das Buch der hängenden Gärten op.15, Cabaret-Songs, Erwartung, Herzgewächse, Pierrot Lunaire (Pierrot Lunaire)
Claude Vivier Ojikawa, Hymnen an die Nacht, Hierophanie
Jörg Widmann Versuch über die Fuge

3 May 2025, 11:00 and 13:00, Wittener Tage für neue Kammermusik

Programme: Sarah Glojnarić Guide to Reality (World premiere)

Cast: Sara Glojnarić (concept, arrangements and co-curation), Paul Hauptmeier und Martin Recker (sound design), Anahí Pérez (light design), Alessandro Batticci (tech support for Digitaize), Kuss Quartett, Sarah Maria Sun (soprano)

11 May 2025, 19:00, Wiener Konzerthaus, Großer Saal

Programme: Amopera - a dystopian ballad; a half concertant meta opera with works by Luciano Berio, Alban Berg, Harrison Birtwistle, Benjamin Britten, Peter Maxwell Davies, Beat Furrer, Sara Glojnarić, Bernhard Lang, Rebecca Saunders, Salvatore Sciarrino, Michael Wertmüller, Iannis Xenakis and Alexander Zemlinsky

Cast: Klangforum Wien, Tim Anderson (conductor), Needcompany, Jan Lauwers (stage director), Grace Ellen Barkey (performer), Paul Blackmann (performer), Holger Falk (baritone), Maarten Seghers (performer), Sarah Maria Sun (soprano)

20 June 2025, 18:00, World Premiere
27 June 2025, 19:30
1/11/18 July 2025, 19:30
Deutsche Oper Berlin

Programme: Rebecca Saunders Lash - Acts of Love, opera in three acts, libretto by Ed Atkins and Rebecca Saunders

Cast: Orchester der Deutschen Oper Berlin, Enno Poppe (conductor), Dead Centre (stage director), Nina Wetzel (set, costumes), Noa Frenkel, Katja Kolm, Anna Prohaska and Sarah Maria Sun (actors) a.o.

21 August 2025, 21:00, Grange aux Concerts, Les Jardins Musicaux, Cernier

Programme: Silence is Golden

Cast: Kilian Herold (clarinet), Jan Philip Schulze (piano), Sarah Maria Sun (soprano)

22 August 2025, 21:00
24 August 2025, 17:00
Grange aux Concerts, Les Jardins Musicaux, Cernier

Programme: Kurt Weill Les Sept Péchés captiaux des petits bourgeois, György Ligeti Mysteries of the Macabre

Cast: Orchestre des Jardins Musicaux, Valentin Reymond (conductor), Christian Rätz (stage director, set), Samantha Landragin (costumes), Benoit Capt (The Father), Anne Gillot (A Speaker), Paul Kirby (Child 1), Stuart Patterson (Child 2), Grzegorz Rózycki (The Mother), Sarah Maria Sun (Anna 1, Anna 2, Soprano)

17 September 2025, 20:00, Transart Festival, Ex-Masten, Bozen

Programme: Amopera - a dystopian ballad, semi concertant meta opera

Cast: Klangforum Wien, Tim Anderson (conductor), Needcompany, Jan Lauwers (stage director), Paul Blackmann (performer), Holger Falk (baritone), Maarten Seghers (performer), Sarah Maria Sun (soprano), Grace Tiang (performer)

23 October 2025, 20:00, musica viva, Herkulessaal der Residenz, Munich

Programme: Jörg Widmann String Quartett No.1, Choralquartett, Jagdquartett, String Quartet No. 4, Versuch über die Fuge

Cast: Korbinian Altenberger (violin), Lorenz Chen (violin), Benedict Hames (viola), Jaka Stadler (cello), Sarah Maria Sun (soprano)

13 February 2026, 19:30, Fürth, Stadttheater Bamberg
14 February 2026, 20:00, Konzerthalle Bamberg

Programme: Jörg Widmann Versuch über die Fuge, Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy Die Hebriden oder Die Fingalshöhle Ouvertüre op. 26, Jörg Widmann Paraphrase about Mendelssohns Wedding March, Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy Andante of the clarinet sonata Es-Dur, Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy Symphony no. 1 c-Moll op. 11

Cast: Bamberger Symphoniker, Jörg Widmann (conductor and clarinet), Barbara Bode (oboe), Ilian Garnetz (violin), Sarah Maria Sun (soprano)

Killer Instincts

Killer Instincts is, in a manner of speaking, a politically incorrect perpetrators’ study. And it is satirizing the new generation of fascist politicians, who swagger about clear enemy images and simple solutions and became a horrible new fashion. For this purpose, I assembled cynical, black-humorous monologues. The narrators of these monologues are stupid, selfish, spineless, lazy, greedy, corrupt, cold blooded, clever, charismatic, shrewd and charming narcissists, who twist us – just like in real life – around their little fingers. Their recipes for a perfectly successful life are obviously immoral, but we are, nevertheless, inevitably seduced into identifying with these enchanting beasts. We want to be like them. We want to laugh with them (not be laughed at). Therefore, we live with them in partnership. Or work for them. Or even vote for them. Not much good coming out of this…

Interestingly, such monologues are hard to find in classical music (which is my actual habitat). That’s why I decided not to care about genres, boxes or gender questions and only go for the contents, the meat. So now very different composers and librettists shake hands for this programme. We have gathered a weird mixture of enormously diverse songs from the classical repertoire and contemporary music, from musical, pop and rock.

So, Killer Instincts shall render both first aid if you badly need to laugh or cry or get the hell scared about the human nature. It is also a pleasurable journey in bad people’s shoes. Which might be a (vanishingly small) drop of help to act more conscious and responsible in our „best of all possible worlds”.

(source: Sarah Maria Sun)

Cast:
Sarah Maria Sun (vocals)
Jan Philip Schulze (piano, electric organ)
Hubert Steiner (Hawaii-, Jazz-, Acoustic-, Steel String-Guitars, Banjo, E-Bass)
Bernd Oezsevim (percussion)
Paul Kleber (bass player)

Programme selection:
Tom Waits Lucky Day Overture
Leonard Bernstein There’s a law about men
Joe Walsh Life’s been good
John Kander When you’re good to Mama
Kurt Weill Der Lotterieagent
Steven Lutvak I don’t understand the poor
Richard Adler A little brains, a little talent
and further works by Kurt Weill, Stephen Sondheim, Franz Schubert i.a.

Killer Instincts will be released on CD in March 2020 on the label mode records, New York City in cooperation with the BR Studio Munich, Germany (recorded 2019).

Dieter Schnebel Yes, I will, Yes (adapted from James Joyce)

is a monodrama for soprano and percussion based on Molly Bloom’s soliloquy at the end of the novel “Ulysses”, by James Joyce. The text is 80 pages long, without full stops or commas: the protagonist’s night-time thoughts – and highly sexual fantasies. The piece is dedicated to soprano Sarah Maria Sun, who will be interpreting these thoughts – partly spoken, partly masterfully sung. The accompaniment consists of a percussion part (mainly vibraphone) and a playback track. This consists of a second voice (also Sarah Maria Sun), as well as synthetic and vocal background sounds. Additionally, Joyce’s entire text is spoken throughout by Sarah Sun (duration approx. 2.5 hours) played at four times the speed, producing a kind of artificial chirping, which contains the whole text.
The piece is a hymn to life, affirmative as it says at the end: “Yes, I Will, Yes!”

(source: Dieter Schnebel)

Cast:
Sarah Maria Sun (soprano)
Vanessa Porter (percussion)
Axel Schäffler (video)

Duration: 60 minutes

„modern lied“

When New Music respectively „modern lied“ are achieved so skillfully and devotedly in various colours and languages, it of course indicates a passion of the interpreters, but it also raises the desire to open up to and confront oneself with it. (Dresdner Neue Nachrichten, 11 June 2017)

The two artists had the idea to this project during breakfast after their first concert together. The accomplished vocal artist of contemporary music Sarah Maria Sun and the experienced pianist Jan Philip Schulze wanted to develop a programme presenting the most extraordinary contemporary lied masterworks. It aimed to be beautiful and at the same time challenging for the artists.

This idea resulted in the vocal programme modern lied, which combines all these aspects and presents an enormous range of composers, such as Heinz Holliger, Salvatore Sciarrino, Helmut Lachenmann, György Kurtág, Wolfgang Rihm, Bernhard Lang, and Georges Asperghis. The release concert of the recently published CD modern lied took place at the Semperoper Dresden in June 2017.

Cast:
Sarah Maria Sun (Soprano)
Jan Philip Schulze (piano)

Programme selection:
Heinz Holliger Sechs Lieder nach Christian Morgenstern (1952-1953)
Salvatore Sciarrino Zwei Melodien (1978)
Helmut Lachenmann Got Lost (2007/08)
György Kurtág Requiem für den Geliebten, op. 26 (1982-1987)
Wolfgang Rihm Ophelia Sings (2012)
Bernhard Lang Wenn die Landschaft aufhört (2015)

At the heart of this are soprano Sarah Maria Sun and baritone Holger Falk, who, throughout the evening, morph into a multitude of characters, personalities, and distorted caricatures - both physically and vocally. Maria Sun's piercing and direct tone brought a welcome clarity to works like "Ach, ich fühl's" from Lang's I Hate Mozart and Rebecca Saunders's O Yes and I, which was performed with a bass flute; they entwined as one. Her rendition of "She Sleeps Like a Rose" from The Rape of Lucretia, which closes every evening, was profoundly poignant. It allowed the weight of all the anger, sadness, and madness of everything prior to dissipate - a very effective end. (...) While it is certainly a team effort, the success of this production lies in how Sarah Maria Sun and Falk have enigmatically embraced the material. They are our conduit into this world, and it would be very easy to feel alienated if they didn't possess the stage presence to sell it.
Opera Now, Jonathan Whiting, 19 May 2025

Sarah Maria Sun’s recent album, “Killer Instincts,” could be a soundtrack for our times.
Whether Sun is performing a selection from Leonard Bernstein’s “Trouble in Tahiti” or a Stefan Wolpe tune from 1930 that laments Hitler’s rising political fortunes, she musters a stylish way of singing about bleak times.
Bernstein’s writing for the stage results in another highlight for Sun. Her performance of “Glitter and Be Gay” (from “Candide”) contains a banjo-led arrangement you never knew you needed. The twangy instrumental accompaniment and Sun’s coloratura brilliance are equally refined; together, they mock putative distinctions between “high” and “low” cultural practices with an energy that any satirist could admire.
The New York Times, Seth Colter Walls, 28 May 2020

Silence is golden

Works by G. Gershwin, B. Britten, L. Bernstein, G. Ligeti, G. Aperghis i.a.

Hänssler, DDD (2025)
Sarah Maria Sun (soprano)
Kilian Herold (clarinet)
Jan Philip Schulze (piano)

Sara Glorjanic: Works "Pure Bliss"

Kairos (2023)
ORF Radio-Symphonieorchester Wien
Klangforum Wien
ensemble mosaik
Neue Vocalsolisten
Marin Alsop, conductor
Sarah Maria Sun, soprano a.o.