About

Soprano Vera Hiltbrunner, born in Bern, Switzerland, performs a variety of styles, which include classical, early, and contemporary music as well as non-classical music. She enjoys a wide and various range of artistic collaborations with ensembles from all over Europe. Vera is an entrepreneur, a story writer, artistic leader and project manager in managing her own creative projects. In her work as a consultant for other artists, Vera is dedicated to helping others finding their way through bureaucracy and the art of organizing their own projects.


In 2023 Vera Hiltbrunner will give her debut as Morgana in “Alcina” ( G.F. Handel), a production by Die Freitagsakademie. Together with the baroque ensemble she will perform at the Berner Stadttheater and go on tour through Germany, Switzerland and Austria.

Opera engagements in 2021 included the world-premiere of “POPPAEA”, a new opera by Michael Hersch and Stephanie Fleischmann. Vera performed the role of Maiden 2 at the Theater Odeon in Vienna together with Ensemble Phoenix Basel (musical direction, Jürg Henneberger; director, Markus Bothe).
In 2019 and 2021 Ms. Hiltbrunner has performed her the role of Despina in Così fan tutte (W. A. Mozart) at Cuvilliés-Theater in Munich with Kammeroper München.

Further operatic roles include Cupido in Diana où la vengeance de Cupido (Reinhard Keiser) with the atélier lyrique génération baroque 2018, Miles in The Turn of the Screw (Benjamin Britten) at Theater KORZO in Den Haag, Anne in The Diary of Anne Frank (Grigory Frid) at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, First Soprano in Dr. Miracle's last illusion with Opera2day, where she sang the aria of Olympia (J. Offenbach) at the Theater De Nieuwe Kolk in Assen (NL) and Adele in Die Fledermaus (J. Strauss) at the Stadsschouwburg & Philharmonie Haarlem (NL)

Vera has performed as a soloist in numerous cantata and oratorio works including: In furore iuistissimae irae (A. Vivaldi), Tra le fiamme (G. F. Händel), Carmina Burana (C. Orff), Stabat Mater (G. B. Pergolesi), Missa in Angustiis (J. Haydn), Ein Sommernachtstraum and Hör mein Bitten (F. Mendelssohn), Oratorio de Noël (Saint- Saëns) and Te Deum (Charpentier).
The soprano has collaborated with ensembles from all over Europe such as Berner Symphonieorchester, Ensemble Phoenix Basel, Die Freitagsakademie, BERNVOCAL, Capella Concertata, Supplements Musicaux, Grenzklang, Terra Nova Collective, Black Forest Percussion Group, SoloVoices and Holst-Sinfonietta.

As an artistic leader, she managed her own baroque trio Ensemble La Casella - with cornettist Jedediah Allen and harpsichordist Andreas Westermann - from 2016 - 2020. The trio toured around Switzerland, Austria and The Netherlands and performed lesser known Early Italian Baroque works as well as new works by young composers such as Calliope Tsoupaki and Simon MacHale. In their project Feast and Famine 2.0, which premiered at Gare du Nord, Basel in 2019, the ensemble performed a program intertwining early music and contemporary music.

Vera is passionate about helping other artists to manage and to organize everything that comes with being a freelance artist. She works as an ambassador for #Seinodernichtsein, an initiative by the SIS and SWISSPERFORM and as a consultant for KulturHub Basel.

Vera Hiltbrunner completed her Masters in vocal studies at the Fontys Hogeschool voor de Kunsten in Tilburg (NL) in 2016 following her Bachelors at the Hochschule für Musik Basel FHNW. Vera was a recipient of the Hans Huber-Stiftung scholarship (Basel) and a study grant from the Stiftung Lyra (Zurich).