Hans Hopf
Hans Hopf ( born August 2, 1916 in Nuremberg, † June 25, 1993 in Munich) was a German heroic tenor.
He studied with Paul Bender in Munich and at Ragnvald Bjärne in Oslo and made his debut in 1936 at the Bavarian State Theatre as Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly. 1939-42, he was a lyric tenor to the ensemble of Augsburg stages and then went to Dresden, where he became the hero tenor. 1946-49 he was a member of the Berlin and then the Munich Opera and gave annually a number of performances at the Vienna State Opera. In 1951, he became a regular in Bayreuth on ( where he the tenor part in the 9th Symphony of Beethoven sang at the reopening of the Bayreuth Festival ). In 1952 he made his debut at the Metropolitan Opera. The La Scala in Milan, the Royal Opera House Covent Garden and other large stages invited the Wagner tenor. This is something forgotten that Hans Hopf was also an outstanding German representatives of the Italian repertoire.
From 1950 he was closely associated with a host contract with the Deutsche Oper am Rhein ( Dusseldorf / Duisburg ), where he repeatedly occurred in the great Wagnerian roles especially with Astrid Varnay. At the Salzburg Festival in 1954 he sang the role of Max in Der Freischütz. Hans Hopf shone especially as Tannhäuser, Siegfried and Tristan was and - equipped with the necessary foundation baritone and tenor of the radiant height as well as the seemingly effortless stamina - as one of the " last " real German Wagner tenors.
After his stage farewell to the Golden jubilee on stage (1988 ), he worked in Munich as an educator. His grandson Dominique Hopf is also a singer.