Sándor Kónya

[1] In 1946 two German businessmen (Anton Giesert and Alfons Lehmkuhle from Ostbevern) supported him financially after he gave a performance in Bielefeld shortly after the war.

Following engagements at Darmstadt, Stuttgart, and Hamburg, Kónya became a member of the Berlin State Opera, in 1955, where he created the role of Leandro in Henze's König Hirsch.

A performance of Nureddin in Peter Cornelius's comic opera Der Barbier von Bagdad, at the Edinburgh Festival in 1956, attracted widespread attention, and his career became more international in scope.

In fourteen seasons at the Met, his roles included Radames, Dick Johnson opposite Renata Tebaldi's Minnie, Calaf in Turandot, another signature role, Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly, Stolzing in Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Max in Der Freischütz, Erik in Der fliegende Holländer, Cavaradossi in Tosca, and a much appreciated Edgardo in Lucia di Lammermoor, which he sang in a new 1964 production, opposite Joan Sutherland.

Gifted with a shining, spinto instrument, Kónya had an easy top register placing him the category known as "jugendlicher heldentenor" while affording him the full plangency of the Italian roles as well.