Sarah Wegener’s singing is nothing short of magnificent; every word is crystal clear, and she masters both soaring dramatic outbursts and intimate, almost spoken passages with effortless ease. “Ethereally, breathtakingly beautiful.” (Süddeutsche Zeitung, Egbert Tholl, 13.11.2022)
Sarah Wegener captivates with her warm timbre and profound artistic expression. She has established herself with renowned orchestras and under major conductors like Mariss Jansons, Vladimir Jurowski, Daniel Harding, and Kirill Petrenko. Her "radiantly glowing, powerful voice" (FAZ) makes her not only a celebrated interpreter of orchestral literature but also an outstanding lieder singer—widely recognized on her award-winning CDs Into the Deepest Sea and Zueignung.
In the 2024/25 season, works by Strauss, Mahler, and Wagner will again be central to her artistic activities. She returns to the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra to perform Strauss's Four Last Songs under Domingo Hindoyan and will be part of Mahler's Eighth Symphony at the Prague Spring and in a semi-staged performance with the London Philharmonic Orchestra under Edward Gardner. Her portrayal of Sieglinde will be presented once more with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra under Petr Popelka in Trieste and with the Orquesta de València under Alexander Liebreich. Additionally, Dvořák’s Stabat Mater with the MDR Symphony Orchestra and the Tonhalle Orchestra Zürich, along with Zemlinsky’s Lyric Symphony in Valencia, are on her schedule. Lieder recitals will take her to the Oxford International Song Festival and the Cologne Philharmonie.
Wegener excels in both classical and contemporary repertoires. She has performed works by Sibelius, Penderecki, and Schoenberg. She has premiered works by Georg Friedrich Haas, including the opera Bluthaus.
She has performed at prestigious festivals such as the Salzburg Festival, Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival, Rheingau Music Festival, and Festival de Lanaudière, bringing her to renowned venues like Suntory Hall, Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, the Berlin Philharmonie, Gewandhaus Leipzig, the Vienna Konzerthaus, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, and the Royal Albert Hall in London. On the opera stage, she has taken on leading roles at the Royal Opera House London, Deutsche Oper Berlin, the Wiener Festwochen, and the Tongyeong Festival in South Korea.
Her discography spans a wide range of works, from Boesmans’ Trakl-Lieder and Korngold’s Die stumme Serenade to Mozart’s Great Mass in C minor and Rossini’s Petite Messe solennelle. Her recording of Jörg Widmann’s Drittes Labyrinth, composed specifically for her, earned an OPUS Klassik nomination. Most recently, her highly acclaimed recording of lieder arranged by B. A. Zimmermann with the WDR Symphony Orchestra was awarded the Choc de Classica, Diapason d'Or, and the German Record Critics' Award.
Sarah Wegener, a British-German soprano with a background in double bass, studied voice with Isolde Assenheimer und Prof. Bernhard Jaeger-Böhm in Stuttgart and attended masterclasses with Dame Gwyneth Jones and Renée Morloc. Since 2024, she has been a professor of singing at the Zurich University of the Arts.
Hailed as “a knockout performer” by The Times, Singaporean-British mezzo Fleur Barron won a 2025 GRAMMY Award for Best Opera Recording, in which she sang the title role in Kaija Saariaho’s Adriana Mater with the San Francisco Symphony under Esa-Pekka Salonen. A passionate interpreter of opera, symphonic works and chamber music ranging from the baroque to the contemporary, Fleur is mentored by Barbara Hannigan.
Fleur opens her 25/26 season with a debut at the Salzburg Festival, reuniting with Esa-Pekka Salonen and Peter Sellars for One Morning Turns into an Eternity, a staged creation featuring Mahler’s “Abschied” from Das Lied von der Erde. Fleur continues her collaboration with Peter Sellars in a return to the title role in Kaija Saariho’s Adriana Mater for her debut at Teatro dell’Opera di Roma. She also makes a house and role debut as Cornelia in Handel’s Giulio Cesare at Maggio Musicale in Florence; performs a staged version of Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde directed by Lemi Ponifasio at The Barbican; George Benjamin’s Into the Little Hill, conducted by the composer, at the Tongyeong Festival in Korea; Piacere in Handel’s Il Trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno with La Nuova Musica under David Bates at Wigmore Hall; and workshops for Bryce Dessner’s Night Sky with Exit Wounds, a monodrama being conceived for Fleur, directed by Kaneza Schaal.
Fleur’s 25/26 symphonic calendar reflects her artistic versatility across a broad range of repertoire. She debuts with the New York Philharmonic under Gustavo Dudamel in the world premiere of David Lang’s oratorio The Wealth of Nations; debuts with the Berlin Philharmonic under Kirill Petrenko in Mahler’s Symphony no.8, which also tours to the Salzburg Easter Festival; returns to both the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Atlanta Symphony at the invitation of Nathalie Stutzmann for Mozart’s Requiem and Bach’s B Minor Mass. Fleur also solidifies her reputation as a Mahler interpreter, singing the Kindertotenlieder with both the Czech Philharmonic under Semyon Bychkov and the RAI National Symphony Orchestra, Torino; Das Lied von der Erde with the Aalborg Symphony Orchestra under Ludovic Morlot and with the Britten Sinfonia; and Symphony no.3 at both the Palau de la Musica Valencia and the Colorado Music Festival. Other symphonic performances include Alma Mahler’s Fünf Lieder with RAI National Symphony Orchestra, Respighi’s Il Tramonto with CBSO under Carlo Rizzi and Mason Bates’ Passage with Nashville Symphony under Giancarlo Guerrero.
Highlights of the 25/26 recital platform include a French song program with Kirill Gerstein at Festival Ravel; a U.S. tour with Trio Afiori, a voice-clarinet-piano trio she has newly formed with Anthony McGill and Gloria Chien. The trio has a residency and concert at Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center before heading to Reno, Portland and Eugene. With long-time duo partner Julius Drake, she gives concerts in Genoa, South Korea, Paris, London, Leeds, and Germany. Fleur joins the Australian String Quartet at the Helsinki Festival and the Parker Quartet at National Sawdust in Brooklyn. Fleur also undertakes a residency with LIFE Victoria Barcelona, for which she performs two recitals with Kunal Lahiry and coaches the young artists.
Highlights of recent seasons include tours of Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde with both the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra under Daniel Harding; Schönberg’s Four Songs, op.22with Vladimir Jurowski and the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin; Claude Vivier’s Wo bist du Licht and Stravinsky’s Pulcinella with Barbara Hannigan and the London Symphony Orchestra; Mahler’s Des Knaben Wunderhorn with Nathalie Stutzmann and the Atlanta Symphony; a tour and recording of Ravel’s Schéhérazade and Trois Poèmes de Mallarmé with the Barcelona Symphony Orchestra; Ottavia in Monteverdi’s L’Incoronazione di Poppea at the Aix-en-Provence Festival, Penelope in Monteverdi’s Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria on tour with baroque ensemble I Gemelli, Concepcion in Ravel’s L’Heure Espagnole with the Barcelona Symphony Orchestra, and Comrade Chin in Huang Ruo’s M Butterfly with the BBC Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican.
Fleur’s discography extends from Hasse and Purcell to Brahms, Barber, Ravel and Saariaho with labels such as Deutsche Grammophon and Pentatone.
Fleur is committed to the way music can facilitate cross-cultural dialogue and healing. She is passionate about curating inclusive chamber music programming that amplifies the voices of diverse communities. Born in Northern Ireland to a Singaporean mother and British father, Fleur grew up in Hong Kong and later New York. She holds degrees from Columbia University (B.A. Comparative Literature) and Manhattan School of Music (M.M. Vocal Performance).
