Tenor Maximilian Schmitt discovered his love of music at a young age with the Regensburger Domspatzen. He studied singing with Prof. Anke Eggers at the Berlin University of the Arts and is artistically coached by Roland Hermann.
He gained his first stage experience as a member of the Opera Studio at Bayerische Staatsoper in Munich before joining the ensemble of the Mannheim National Theater for four years in 2008. In 2012, he made his debut at the Amsterdam Opera as Tamino under Marc Albrecht. In 2016 Maximilian Schmitt he debuted as Idomeneo in another major Mozart role, this time at the Opéra du Rhin in Strasbourg. Immediately afterwards, he appeared for the first time at the Vienna State Opera as Don Ottavio. In 2017, he made a guest appearance at La Scala in Milan, where he debuted as Pedrillo in Mozart’s Abduction from the Seraglio under Zubin Mehta. In 2019, he sang his first Max in Weber’s Freischütz at the Aalto Theater in Essen, followed in 2022 by his debut as Erik in the Flying Dutchman at the Graz Opera.
Maximilian Schmitt is a regular guest on the major international concert stages. His broad repertoire ranges from Monteverdi and Mozart to Mendelssohn, Elgar, Mahler, Zender and Britten. Invited by conductors such as Franz Welser-Möst, Claudio Abbado, Teodor Currentzis, Daniel Harding, Jonathan Nott, Manfred Honeck, Philippe Herreweghe, Thomas Hengelbrock, Fabio Luisi, Trevor Pinnock, René Jacobs or Robin Ticciati, he has already worked, among others with the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, the Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich, the symphony orchestras of the Bavarian and Central German Radio, the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra, the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig. Maximilian Schmitt is also a regular guest of the Orchestre de Paris or the Orchestre National de France.
In the 2022/23 season, Maximilian Schmitt returns to the Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino as David in Wagner’s Meistersinger and again interprets Erik in Wagner’s Flying Dutchman at the Cologne Opera and the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris, conducted by François Xavier Roth.
In concert he is invited to perform Mendelssohn’s Elijah with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra under Kirill Petrenko, Haydn’s Creation with the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra under Jakub Hrusa, Franz Schmidt’s The Book with the Seven Seals at the Vienna Musikverein under Ingo Metzmacher, and the narrator’s part in Schumann’s Paradies und die Peri with the Gürzenich Orchestra. Of course, Bach is not to be missed: at Easter 2023 he will sing the Evangelist in Bach’s St. Matthew´s Passion in Rotterdam with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra under Peter Dijkstra.
Together with Gerold Huber at the piano, he has also performed various Lied programs at the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, the Heidelberger Frühling, the Schubertiade Schwarzenberg, the Kölner Philharmonie, the Wigmore Hall in London and the Düsseldorf Tonhalle. In the current season, the two can be heard in a recital in Santiago de Compostela.
His discography includes his solo albums “Träumend wandle ich bei Tag”, “Die schöne Müllerin” and “Wie freundlich strahlt der Tag”. Maximilian Schmitt is also featured on numerous other CD releases such as Belmonte in Mozart’s Abduction from the Seraglio with the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin under René Jacobs (harmonia mundi).