Caroline Merz

* 1962 in Düsseldorf; soprano; first studied piano at the Robert Schumann Hochschule Düsseldorf, switched to singing in 1985 and continued her studies at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, then with Grace Bumbry in Lugano and from 1991 with Kammersängerin Csilla Zentai. She twice won first prize in the VDMK federal competition and first prize in the Iris Adami Corradetti Competition. In 1988/89 she received her first engagement at the Volksoper in Vienna; from 1993 to 1995 she was a member of the ensemble of the Volksoper and Staatsoper in Vienna and sang there, among other roles, the First Lady in “Die Zauberflöte”. On the albums Carl Reinecke: Complete Children’s Songs (Vol. 1) and Carl Reinecke: Complete Children’s Songs (Vol. 2) (both 2001), which she initiated with Thomas Leander for two children’s hospital wards in Düsseldorf, she sings Reinecke’s children’s songs, also in duets with Martha Marquez and Carola Guber.