Jens-Erik Aasbø
The Norwegian bass Jens-Erik Aasbø graduated from the Oslo Opera Academy in 2011 and has since been a member of the soloist ensemble of the Norwegian Opera & Ballet, where in the current season he will be heard as Trulove in Igor Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress, as Dottore Grenvil in Giuseppe Verdi's La traviata and as Angelotti in Giacomo Puccini's Tosca.
In Oslo in recent seasons he has been successful in major roles in his field, for example as Sarastro in Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's The Magic Flute, as Gremin in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin, as Il Commendatore and Masetto in Mozart's Don Giovanni, as Basilio in Gioachino Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia, as the police chief in Dmitri Shostakovich's Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, as Padre Guardiano in Verdi's La forza del destino, Uncle Bonze in Puccini's Madama Butterfly, as Rocco in Ludwig van Beethoven's Fidelio, as Raimondo in Gaetano Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor, as Lieutenant Ratcliffe in Benjamin Britten's Billy Budd, as Bartolo in Mozart's Le nozze di Figaro, as Sparafucile in Verdi's Rigoletto and as Hunding in Richard Wagner's The Valkyrie.
Jens-Erik Aasbø is also in demand internationally and will make his house debut as Bartolo in Le nozze di Figaro at the Zurich Opera in the 2024/25 season and his house and role debut as Veit Pogner in the new production of Wagner's The Masters-Singers of Nuremberg at the Royal Danish Opera in Copenhagen. He also makes his debut as King Marke in a concert performance of Wagner's Tristan and Isolde with the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra under Petr Popelka.
His most recent engagements include Daland in Wagner's The Flying Dutchman at the Spring Festival in Tokyo and previously at the Opera på Skäret in Sweden, Wassermann in Antonín Dvořák's Rusalka at the Komische Oper Berlin as well as Fasolt in Wagner's The Rhinegold and as Komtur in Don Giovanni at the Theatro Municipal de São Paulo.
Jens-Erik Aasbø made his debut at the Bayreuth Festival in the summer of 2022 as Fasolt in The Rhinegold, as Reinmar von Zweter in Tannhäuser and as 4. Edler in Lohengrin. In the summer of 2023 he returned to Bayreuth as Fasolt and Reinmar von Zweter, but was also seen in the new production of Parsifal as the 2nd Knight of the Grail. He sang these three roles again at the Bayreuth Festival in 2024