About
Kurt Moll (11 April 1938 – 5 March 2017) was a German opera singer (bass profundo).
In his youth he learned to play the guitar and cello, and was a soloist in the school choir. He continued his musical education at the Cologne University of Music and took private lessons with Emmy Müller in Krefeld. At the age of 20, he began his career at the Cologne Opera and was soon invited to Aachen. This was followed by an invitation from the Mainz State Theatre and a contract as first bass in Wuppertal. In 1967, Moll made his debut at the Bayreuth Festival, and in 1970 at the Salzburg Music Festival he became known to the world thanks to the part of Sarastro in The Magic Flute. In 1972, he made his debut at the Milan La Scala as Osmin (The Abduction from the Seraglio), and in 1974 in San Francisco as Gurnemanz (Parsifal). He made his debut at the New York Metropolitan Opera in the 1979 concert season, singing the roles of Rocco (Fidelio) and Sparafucile (Rigoletto). Kurt Moll's repertoire includes the big bass roles of Mozart, Wagner and Strauss, but he also sang the bass roles of Weber (The Hermit in Der Freischütz) and Prokofiev (The Inquisitor in The Fiery Angel). He performed in Hamburg, Vienna, Bayreuth, Salzburg and Munich, was a chamber singer at the Bavarian, Hamburg and Vienna Opera Houses and a professor of vocals at the Cologne University of Music. Moll's discography includes the roles of Osmin, Sarastro, Falstaff and Gurnemanz with orchestras conducted by Georg Solti, Herbert von Karajan, Wolfgang Sawallisch and Karl Böhm. His interpretation of Franz Schubert's song cycle "Winter Journey" with piano accompaniment is very unusual. The recording was released in 1983 and is a rare phenomenon of an opera singer appearing as a chamber singer. A few years later another recording was released, and in 1996 a double CD with ballads by Karl Löwe. On 31 July 2006, Moll said goodbye to the opera stage after his last role as "The Night Watchman" in Wagner's "The Mastersingers of Nuremberg" at the Munich Opera Festival. He was married to Ursula Moll and had three children.