Lise Davidsen

Norwegian soprano Lise Davidsen made her Royal Opera debut in the 2018/19 Season singing Freia (Das Rheingold), Ortlinde (Die Walküre) and Third Norn (Götterdämmerung). She also sang the soprano solo in Verdi’s Requiem under Antonio Pappano. In the 2019/20 Season she sang Leonore (Fidelio). 

Davidsen studied singing at the Grieg Academy of Music in Bergen, and as a student sang in the Norwegian Soloists Choir as a mezzo-soprano. She switched to soprano repertory while studying for her Masters degree at the Royal Danish Academy of Music and graduated from Copenhagen’s Opera Academy in 2014. Key operatic appearances since have included Liza (The Queen of Spades) for Stuttgart Opera and the Metropolitan Opera, New York, Prima Donna/Ariadne (Ariadne auf Naxos) for Aix-en-Provence Festival, Vienna State Opera and Glyndebourne Festival, Agathe (Der Freischütz) for Zürich Opera, the title role in Cherubini’s Medea for Wexford Festival, Santuzza (Cavalleria rusticana) and the title role in Sancta Susanna for Norwegian National Opera, Isabella (Das Liebesverbot) for Teatro Colón, Buenos Aires, Leonore (Fidelio) for Opéra de Montréal and Elisabeth (Tannhäuser) in her 2019 Bayreuth Festival debut. 

In concert, Davidsen has sung in an artistic residency with the Bergen Philharmonic, and with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra (at the BBC Proms), London Philharmonic Orchestra, Philharmonia, Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre de Paris, Staatskapelle Berlin, Oslo Phiharmonic Orchestra, Danish National Symphony Orchestra, Aalborg Symphony Orchestra, Oslo Philharmonic and the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, in repertory including works by Beethoven, Grieg, Mahler, Richard Strauss and Sibelius. She has given recitals in London, Oslo, Copenhagen and Bergen. Her international awards include First Prize in the Queen Sonja International Competition and First Prize in Operalia (both 2015). In 2019 she released her debut album of Wagner and Strauss for Decca.