Martin-Jan Nijhof

Since 2016, Dutch bass-baritone Martin-Jan Nijhof has been a permanent member of the Semperoper Dresden ensemble. Alongside his work in Dresden, he appeared as Wotan in Das Rheingold at Stadttheater Klagenfurt and in the title role of Der fliegende Holländer at Theater Osnabrück in 2025.

His Semperoper repertoire includes Figaro and Bartolo in Le nozze di Figaro, Escamillo in Carmen, Colline in La bohème, Don Alfonso in Così fan tutte, Angelotti in Tosca, Truffaldin in Ariadne auf Naxos and the Speaker in Die Zauberflöte. He has also sung Surin in The Queen of Spades, Hans Folz in Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, the Judicial Counsellor in Intermezzo and the Doctor in Shostakovich’s The Nose. His collaborators include conductors Christian Thielemann, Omer Meir Wellber, Christoph Gedschold, Mikhail Tatarnikov, Evelino Pidò, Leonardo Sini, Giedrė Šlekytė, Evan Rogister, Gaetano d’Espinosa, John Fiore, Petr Popelka and Giampaolo Bisanti.

Mr. Nijhof has appeared in numerous audio and video recordings, including Il tabarro with the Dresden Philharmonic under Marek Janowski; La bohème, Rigoletto, La traviata and Tosca with the NDR Radiophilharmonie under Keri-Lynn Wilson; La fanciulla del West with the Transylvania State Philharmonic under Lawrence Foster; and Don Giovanni with the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra under David Stern.

In concert, he sings the bass solos in Bach’s St Matthew Passion, St John Passion and Christmas Oratorio; Rossini’s and Dvořák’s Stabat Mater; Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony; Brahms’s Ein deutsches Requiem and Vier ernste Gesänge; Mendelssohn’s Elijah; and Mahler’s Kindertotenlieder.

Before Dresden, Mr. Nijhof held ensemble positions at Landestheater Niederbayern in Passau, Theater Regensburg and Theater Magdeburg. During this period, he sang Kaspar in Der Freischütz, Wozzeck, Don Giovanni and Leporello, Daland in Der fliegende Holländer, Sarastro, Raimondo in Lucia di Lammermoor, Orest in Elektra, the Bonze in Madama Butterfly, Timur in Turandot and Bottom in A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

Born in Ravenstein in the Netherlands, he studied with Barbara Schlick at Maastricht Conservatory and completed postgraduate studies with Reginaldo Pinheiro at the Hochschule für Musik Freiburg. He continues to work closely with bass Jaakko Ryhänen.