During her 10 years of choir membership in the girls' choir at Cologne Cathedral, she already received her first solo tasks, was also the singer of a jazz band of the so called Cathedral-music for a long time and, after her High school graduation, studied singing at the Cologne Academy of Music with Prof. Mechthild Georg and in Rome at the Conservatorio Santa Cecilia. She attended master classes with Krisztina Laki, Kurt Widmer, Ingeborg Danz and others and continues to work closely with Prof. Michaela Krämer in Düsseldorf.
Engagements take the singer to festivals at home and abroad, such as the Festival Internazio- nale di Musica e Arte Sacra in Italy, Switzerland, South Tyrol, Russia, the International Handel Festival in Göttingen, the Beethoven Festival Bonn, the Brühl Castle Concerts, to opera houses such as Krefeld/ Mönchengladbach, Koblenz, Gelsenkirchen, the Mar- gravial Opera House in Bayreuth, the Tonhalle Düssel- dorf, the Cologne and Essen Philharmonics and, last but not least, regularly to large churches, always particularly fond of the local cathedral.
With self-developed programmes such as “Frau Nelles und die Nachtigall” (Mrs. Nelles & the nightin- gale) or the “Advent-Calendar- Concerts” , which have been very successful for many years, she can also be experienced and offers additionally charming concert programmes for young listeners.
The soprano has worked with the Neue Phil- harmonie Westfalen, the Bochumer Sinfoniker, the WDR Funkhausorchester, the Gürzenichor- chester Köln, BonnBarock, Musica Alta Ripa, Concerto Köln, Concert Royal and many others.
With the scenic performance of J. S. Bach's St. Matthew Passion the singer could be ex- perienced for the first time at the renowned Bach Festival Leipzig in 2019.
Theresa Nelles is also very active in the field of New Music and has given many world premieres, such as the interdisciplinary composition Lieder in Bildern by Markus Schönewolf, the opera Abraham and the oratorio Logos by the well-known Swiss composer Daniel Schnyder and coming up next is the opera Oh ihr Menschen by Wolfgang Abend- roth.
