ChelseaZurflüh
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About Chelsea
First Prize Winner of the Concours de Genève 2024 Main Prize (female voice) and Orchestra Prize Winner at the Junge Opernstars / Emmerich Smola Competition 2025
In the 2024/25 season, Chelsea will make her debut at the Handel Festspiele with Clori Clori, Tirsi e Fileno and a role debut as Serpina in Pergolesi's La Serva Padrona at Theatre Biel-Solothurn. On the concert scene, this season she debuted with the Tonkünstler Orchestra, singing Handel's Messiah at the Musikverein Wien, Stadttheater Wiener Neustadt, St.Pölten Festspielhaus and Innsbruck Congress, led by Ivor Bolton, Matthew Halls and Andreas Ottensamer. She works regularly at the Tonhalle Zürich and highlights this season there include a New Year's concert with Heiko Mathias Förster and the Zürcher Symphoniker; concerts to celebrate Mozart's birthday with CHAARTS Chamber Artists and a Strauss Gala Concert with the Prague Philharmonic Orchestra.
On the competition scene, this season she has had major success in competitions around Europe. She is the prizewinner of the renowned 78th Concours de Genève 2024. Along with the first prize, she won nine special prices which include a role in the Grand Théâtre de Genève and several other concert possibilites. At the SWR Junge Opernstars 2025, she won first prize for Female Voice as well as the Emmerich Smola Orchestra Prize of the Deutschen Radio Philharmonie.
Chelsea was a member of the International Opera Studio in Zurich in the seasons from 2021 to 2023, where she appeared as Barbarina in Le Nozze di Figaro, as Zaida in Il Turco in Italia, as Atalanta in Serse and other operas on the stage of the Zurich Opera House and the Theatre Winterthur. At the Theatre Biel-Solothurn she sang the title role in the world premiere of the opera Heidi feiert Weihnachten in December 2023 written by the Swiss Composer Fabian Müller. In the summer of 2023, she debuted the leading role of Licori in Vivaldis La Fida Ninfa at the renowned Innsbruck Festival of Early Music, which was recorded and released by CPO in January 2025. She has also sang various concerts at prestigious venues such as the Wiener Konzerthaus, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Prague State Opera, the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Palace of Culture Dresden, Philharmonie Cologne and Stuttgart Liederhalle.
Representation
Exclusive Worldwide Representation with Askonas Holt
Season Highlights
Video
Chelsea Zurflüh sings Linda
Chelsea Zurflüh sings Linda's aria "Ah tardai troppo...O luce di quest'anima" from Donizetti's Linda di Chamonix in her winning performance in the final of the Concours de Genève 2024. Credit: Concours de Genève
PlayingChelsea Zurflüh sings Juliette
Chelsea Zurflüh sings Juliette's aria "Je Veux Vivre" from Gounod's Roméo et Juliette in her winning performance at the SWR Junge Opernstars 2025 competition. Credit: SWR Junge Opernstars
PlayingChelsea Zurflüh sings Vivaldi
Chelsea Zurflüh sings the aria "Alma oppressa da sorte crudele" from Vivaldi's La fida ninfa, recorded by CPO. Released in January 2025. Credit: CPO
Playing
Photos
News
Press
Concours de Genève 2024
Grand Théâtre de GenèveOct 2024We are on the verge of this somewhat disillusioned and regretful reflection when the last competitor, the Swiss soprano Chelsea Marilyn Zurflüh (28 years old), enters. Grasping with determination the Cleopatra aria " Da tempeste il legno infranto " from Handel's Giulio Cesare , a refreshing draft runs through the audience. The voice is beautiful, the vocalises more than correct, the vocal opening powerful, everything in this voice enchants. The audience is not mistaken and applauds her admirable performance wildly. In Pamina's aria " Ach, ich fühl's " from Mozart's Die Zaubeflöte , we admire the sensitivity without mawkishness with which the soprano interprets this aria. In passing, she rewards us with high notes of great quality emerging as the natural continuity of the aria. Nothing is forced, everything is measured in the spirit of the text, in the impeccable line of song. Velvet. Here again, the audience exults. The soprano ends her passage with the perilous recitative and aria of Linda " Ah, tardai troppo…. O luce di quest'anima " from Donizetti's Linda di Chamounix . Playing with herself on stage, smiling, mischievous, she seems to play with the technical and vocal difficulties of this aria with an uncommon authority. In the rigorous freedom of her interpretation, Chelsea Marilyn Zurflüh brings in her wake the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande , which finally leaves its role of accompanist to become an integral part of the music being played on stage.
- Resmusica
- 25 October 2024
She's 28 years old, with an incredible presence - her body, her smile - and a voice as clear as spring water: on Tuesday, soprano Chelsea Marilyn Zurflüh won the final of the singing competition organised as part of the 78th Geneva International Music Competition, which this year was also open to composers. And she won by a landslide. She was already considered the favourite at the end of the semi-finals, when the three finalists were chosen to perform with the Orchestre de la Suisse romande on the Grand Théâtre stage, under the baton of conductor Alevtina Ioffe. Chelsea Marilyn Zurflüh owed her crown, in particular, to the exceptional quality of her high notes which she displayed in the aria "Ah! tardai troppo" from Donizetti's opera Linda di Chamounix , freed from the stridency which often strains the timbre at these altitudes. Notes attacked effortlessly, darted with an impressive power of projection and purity of intonation.
- Le Temps
- 25 September 2025
