Right now the place where I go to chill out is the amphitheatre on top of the Teatro Maggio Musicale, where I’m currently rehearsing Verdi’s FALSTAFF for the Opera di Firenze. From here you can see across to the Brunelleschi Dome, the roof of St John’s Baptistery and the tower of the Palazzo Vecchio that dominates the panorama. All mesmerising edifices, magnificent and illustrious.

I’m transported back to a bygone era when I’m in that city. When I’m wending my way through the narrow, cobbled lanes towards the Piazza della Republica, I try to shut out the tacky souvenir shops and phone vendors and crowds of people, all of which I’m undeniably a part of. I’m always impatient to get to the Piazza and find a place to sit and just take in the spectacle.

The city would be a special place for me anyway, it being considered the cradle of opera. The composers I’ve had most to do with in the course of my career, like Verdi, have been Italians. Or – like Wagner, who died in Venice – they felt a deep affinity with the country. Many think of Wagner and Verdi as polar opposites – one devoted to Italian levity, the other a brooding Teuton – but I don’t like to pigeonhole in that way. I don’t have the scholarship to back it up, but I’m sure they each were familiar with and admired the work of the other. Verdi is clearly not as big on text – FALSTAFF apart – as Wagner is. But both bodies of work call for singers to be at the top of their game.

Wagner is always coming up with exquisite phrases and this is also true of THE FLYING DUTCHMAN, in which I’m currently guesting at the Deutsche Oper Berlin. When my character, the Dutchman, makes his first entrance on stage, his long and difficult monologue includes the pianissimo plea »I ask you, exalted angel of God«, which reminds me of Wotan’s farewell in THE VALKYRIE, »the pair of shimmering eyes«, and has to be bursting with positive energy. The biggest ask for me, though, is the duet I have with Senta in Act 2, almost 15 minutes long, which builds and builds and rises in pitch. It stretches you technically and requires a degree of maturity. You have to sustain a level of vocal sublimity. No, Wagner is definitely not for novices. And you should have a break from him, too, occasionally. That’s a tip from me after 33 years in the business.

Volle on the roof of the Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino. The »Cavea« is used as a 2,000-capacity open-air amphitheatre in the summer months © Barbara Leolini

 

Years of experience that smooth out some of the challenges - even if there are some things I’ll never get used to: however much I adore Florence, Milan and New York, I’ll always be plagued by their inability to quieten down at night. Back home in Kleinmachnow, which is more my permanent refuge from the daily grind, it’s quite different. My veranda is where I can kick back and recharge properly, preferably with my wife and our two children, the cat, too, if she wants. It opens onto a stretch of greenery with shrubs, berries, flower beds, and big fir trees in the background that sway wildly in the wind. It’s an awe-inspiring sight, sometimes forbidding, but really fulfilling to watch.

That’s what makes my veranda my real place of serenity for my soul, the spot I like to return to. Early this year I spent a few months at the Met in New York doing FALSTAFF and the plan was for the family to follow, because I don’t like the long periods of separation. But then my wife, Gabriela Scherer, had to cover for someone as Arabella at the Deutsche Oper Berlin, so we had to resort to facetiming each other for weeks. The view out onto our garden on my little screen really got me yearning badly to be back home, stretching out in the light of the moon or the fire bowl.

Not that I don’t like to make the occasional holiday trip. My sister is married to an Italian and they’ve got an old mill near Florence, where I sometimes drop by. But whether I’m travelling for work or pleasure, I always look forward to coming home, listening to the sound of nature and sipping on a cup of coffee or a glass of wine in my little oasis of calm.