After completing a master’s degree in modern literature, the mezzo-soprano Elsa Maurus studied singing with Eugénia Besala-Ludwig, the mother of Christa Ludwig, then with Heidi Raymond in Geneva. She made her début at the Nantes Opera House in Léo Delibes’s Le roi l’a dit, followed by the rôle of Rosina in Il barbiere di Siviglia in Rouen. In the same year, 1994, Georges Prêtre cast her in the rôle of Mara in the Opéra d’Aran by Gilbert Bécaud, which he conducted at the Konzerthaus in Vienna, with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra. Her first recording was of Gouvy’s Requiem, which was awarded the Diapason d’Or and a Choc du Monde de la Musique. She also recorded the soundtrack for Fina Torrès’s film, Mécaniques Célestes, the story of a young Rossini singer. Elsa Maurus is known as a recitalist, with a repertoire that includes songs by Mahler and by Schubert, and for her concert performances as a soloist in major works for voice and orchestra including Debussy’s Martyre de Saint Sébastien, which she sang in Rome and in Vienna under Georges Prêtre, Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde in Japan and Berlioz’s Roméo et Juliette and L’enfance du Christ in Paris. Her career has brought appearances throughout Europe and in America both in the concert hall and in opera.