Reviews

“The cast was good and homo­ge­neous: Mag­dale­na Anna Hoff­mann and Daniel Franck han­dled the dif­fi­cult cou­ple in a noble way…”

Piero Mioli, L’Opera

“For the per­for­mance of Novem­ber 15 the role of Fidelio/Leonore was assigned to Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann who turned out to live up to the demands of this char­ac­ter, both sceni­cal­ly and vocal­ly: the sopra­no was greet­ed with long applause thanks to the excel­lent vol­ume of her voice and homoge­nous timbre.”

Pia Lom­bar­di, Ieri, Oggi, Domani, Opera

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann (12 Novem­ber) boasts a first octave sound­ing more sonorous and is also more agile on stage. Her Leonore is deter­mined and ful­ly aware.”

Sil­vano Capec­chi, OperaClick

“In front of Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann, the audi­ence bows. The sopra­no makes her debut in Hagen as Isol­de; she turns the title char­ac­ter into an angry war­rior princess with a mys­te­ri­ous depth, a rich mid-range and a high range full of bit­ter­sweet splen­dor that makes her pas­sion a force of nature. Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann is a sen­sa­tion­al dis­cov­ery in the Wag­n­er repertoire.”

West­falen­post

“… the singers also devel­op great charis­ma and pres­ence in this con­text. Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann undoubt­ed­ly has the self-con­fi­dence that the stag­ing ascribes to her… . … both of them make a great cou­ple in terms of vocal col­or, and they stead­fast­ly assert them­selves amongst the exul­ta­tion of the orchestra.”

Karsten Mark , Ruhr Nachrichten

“Above all, this applies to Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­man­n’s effort­less, nev­er shrill Isol­de, even in her dra­mat­ic out­bursts. In the end she has enough strength for a tru­ly exem­plary Liebestod…”

Joachim Lange, Concerti 

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann is a lyri­cal­ly tim­bered, ini­tial­ly almost frag­ile Isol­de, whose vocal­iza­tion is increas­ing­ly gain­ing sub­stance, and brought Bigan­zo­lis direc­to­r­i­al con­cept to life with ter­rif­ic acting.”

Regi­na Müller, Die Deutsche Bühne

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann made her role debut as Isol­de in Hagen. And what a debut it was! She was much cel­e­brat­ed by the audi­ence at its end. Of course also for the rav­ish­ing, emo­tion­al­ly sung and enthralling ” Mild und leise wie er lächelt…(Liebestod)”, but that was not all. From the first act on (her expres­sive” Wie lachend sie mir Lieder sin­gen ”) Ms. Hof­mann con­vinced with her pow­er­ful sopra­no, which she also knew how to use ten­der­ly and with reserve. Her mas­tery of the obsta­cles of one of the most dif­fi­cult sopra­no roles seemed almost effort­less. And yet the role of Isol­de is any­thing but effort­less. Her char­ac­ter­i­za­tion of Isol­de, with all the facets that Wag­n­er gave to this role, was out­stand­ing. Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­man­n’s debut as Richard Wag­n­er’s ISOLDE could not have been more con­vinc­ing! BRAVO for this great vocal performance!”

Detlef Obens, Das Opernmagazin

“The inter­na­tion­al­ly sought-after MAGDALENA ANNA HOFMANN has devel­oped into a dra­mat­ic sopra­no. After Isol­de in Hagen, Beethoven’s Leonore will be her next role debut in Bologna. … The sopra­no dom­i­nates the tes­si­tu­ra of the Wag­n­er part with great verve. A spe­cial advan­tage of her inter­pre­ta­tion is the soft­ly round­ed tone of her youth­ful tim­bre, and her mel­low, round­ly pro­duced sound, which keeps Isol­de from the becom­ing a heavy­weight Hero­ine. The Liebestod rings lyri­cal­ly up to the effort­less final Fs in pianissimo.”

Christoph Zim­mer­mann, Online Merker

“The same applies to Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann as Isol­de. Her sopra­no has great radi­ance and dra­ma. Her duet with Nyári in the sec­ond act real­ly gets under one’s skin… and her grandiose “Liebestod” stirs tears.”

Thomas Molke, Online Musik Magazin

“The Pol­ish-Aus­tri­an sopra­no Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann in the role of Isol­de is an absolute­ly top dis­cov­ery this evening. With her daz­zling vocal shades, her pro­found depth and her tech­ni­cal­ly skilled expres­sive out­bursts, she con­veys pure emo­tion and pas­sion. In addi­tion, she man­ages to snend almost every sung word over the orches­tra with an impres­sive tex­tu­al under­stand­ing. She knows how to mas­ter her ener­gy with her abil­i­ties and unleash­es her voice in the right places. Her Liebestod has enchant­i­ng ten­der­ness and warmth. An impres­sive achieve­ment and an insid­er tip for the cast­ing squad of larg­er houses.”

Ingo Luther, Klas­sik Begeistert

“Glücks­fall”
“Die Auf­führung ste­ht und fällt mit der Beset­zung der Haup­trol­le. Die pol­nis­che Sopranistin Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann, die in ihrer bish­eri­gen inter­na­tionalen Kar­riere unter anderem schon Wag­n­ers Kundry und Elsa gesun­gen hat, ist für Bern ein Glücks­fall. Mit ihrer drama­tis­chen und emo­tionalen Stimme sowie ihrer darstel­lerischen Wand­lungs­fähigkeit ver­lei­ht sie der Titelfig­ur eine sen­sa­tionelle Ausstrahlung.”

Thomas Schacher, Neue Zürcher Zeitung

“Hof­mann schafft es, mit facetten­re­ichem Sopran die Zer­ris­senheit ihrer Fig­ur nachvol­lziehbar darzustellen. Ihr glaubt man, mit ihr lei­det man mit. Im Win­ter wie im Som­mer und bis zum tragis­chen Tod.”

Maria Kün­zli, Bern­er Zeitung

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann als Anna Karen­i­na überzeugt mit ihrem facetten­re­ichen Sopran gle­ich­wohl im Mit­tel­bere­ich ihrer tragfähi­gen Stimme während der erzäh­len­den Monologe und eben­so den drama­tis­chen Höhen­at­tack­en. Ihr dun­kles Tim­bre spiegelt in dynamis­chen Dif­feren­zierun­gen die grüb­lerische Kon­sti­tu­tion der kon­se­quent Lieben­den und erfüllte zudem in darstel­lerisch bek­lem­mender Inten­sität ein schick­sal­haftes Frauenportrait.”

Ger­hard Hoff­mann, Der Neue Merker

“Die Stärke der Auf­führung liegt aber auch in der Beset­zung der Haup­trollen: Allen voran glänzt die pol­nis­che Sopranistin Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann, deren Stimme sich vielle­icht eher für Strauss oder Wag­n­er eignet, die aber die Titel­par­tie mit der nöti­gen Dra­matik singt, gute Tiefen hat (sie sang früher Mez­zopar­tien) und sehr aus­drucksstark agiert.”

Alice Math­e­son, Der Neue Merker

“Für diese ist Mag­da­lene Anna Hof­mann in all ihren vokalen und kör­per­sprach­lichen Dif­feren­zierun­gen eine ide­ale Akteurin.”

Hans-Klaus Junghein­rich, Faust Kultur

“… Kundry Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann starts dressed as Wag­n­er to trans­form her­self into sev­er­al of his female char­ac­ters – and at the same time nev­er leaves out dra­mat­i­cal­ly blaz­ing sopra­no notes.”

Wal­ter Wei­dringer, Die Presse

“… the ensem­ble of singers around Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­man­n’s vocal­ly vir­tu­osic Kundry … ful­fi­ills its task perfectly.”

Jörn Flo­ri­an Fuchs, Berlin­er Mor­gen­post / BR Klas­sik / Deutsch­land­funk Kultur

“Hof­mann is both seduc­tive and car­i­ca­ture-imbued, mor­ph­ing from a Wag­n­er dop­pel­ganger, to Bar­barel­la, to an armored Teu­ton­ic princess.”

Rebec­ca Schmid, Clas­si­cal Voice America

“All of the singers, includ­ing the exposed Cundry (Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann) per­form mag­nif­i­cent­ly and mas­ter the some­times tir­ing loop-like repeat­ed phras­es perfectly.”

Daniel Ender, Neue Zürcher Zeitung

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­man­n’s Kundry is con­front­ed with sim­i­lar demands, but she is an expe­ri­enced “real” Wag­n­er singer.”

Renate Wag­n­er, Der Neue Merker

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann as Kundry is – in dif­fer­ent cos­tumes – on stage the whole time of the per­for­mance. Vocal­ly she can excel, sexy as Bar­barel­la, in the seduc­tion scene in the sec­ond act.”

Stephan Buri­anek, Orpheus

“Very strong was … Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann as witchy seduc­tress Kundry.”

Michael Tschi­da, Kleine Zeitung

“excel­lent”

Gert Korentschnik, Kurier

“Hof­mann is an intense, con­cen­trat­ed artist as she has shown here in the twen­ti­eth-cen­tu­ry reper­toire. Her sopra­no is slen­der and pen­e­trat­ing (…), her glazed deter­mi­na­tion and obses­sive ded­i­ca­tion to the Dutch­man made for a riv­et­ing performance. ”

Stephen J. Mudge, Opera News

“…thanks to the lyri­cal ground­ing of her spin­to voice she fur­nished the role with espe­cial col­oration and feel­ing. This was aug­ment­ed by the expres­siv­i­ty of the out­stand­ing stage per­son­al­i­ty that she already demon­strat­ed here in Schoenberg’s ‘Erwartung’ and pre­sum­ably will show again as Car­lot­ta in Schreker’s Die Geze­ich­neten lat­er this season.”

W. Kutschbach, Das Opernglas

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann was a Sen­ta of the high­est order, play­ing the dou­ble reg­is­ter of Senta’s appar­ent fragili­ty and, through her vocal pow­er, the inner strength that allows her ulti­mate­ly to pre­vail over the ele­ments.  In the Bal­lade, the singer deployed all the nuances from mur­mur to cry, from nos­tal­gic rever­ie to fer­vent prayer.  One is under the spell of the character’s pal­pa­ble ten­sion, her voice reach­ing to the very lim­it, in this rad­i­cal inter­pre­ta­tion (see the inter­view that the singer grant­ed us).”

Fab­rice Malka­ni, Forumopéra.com

“The musi­cal side of things was of high qual­i­ty…. …a con­fir­ma­tion of the incan­des­cent and diehard Sen­ta of sopra­no Mag­dale­na Hofmann….”

Chris­t­ian Mer­lin, Le Figaro

“Thank God Mag­dale­na Anna Hofmann…sang a clear and pow­er­ful Sen­ta with­out exag­ger­a­tion, capa­ble of empa­thet­ic lyri­cism, demon­strat­ing a beau­ti­ful tim­bre and no signs of strain: a thor­ough­ly con­vinc­ing depic­tion of the role.”

Robert Jung­wirth, Klassikinfo.de

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann was thor­ough­ly con­vinc­ing in the argu­ments with Daland and thrilled the audi­ence in her mind-blow­ing final which showed off her shin­ing lyri­cism through high B‑natural.”

Beate Lange­bruch, Bachtrack

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann was a pow­er­ful and…beautiful-voiced Senta….”

Hel­mut Mau­ró, Süd­deutsche Zeitung

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hofmann’s Sen­ta does­n’t back off in the slight­est, with her musi­cal, shift­ing col­ors; high notes that nev­er came off as hard­ened; and well-direct­ed shading.”

Anaclase.com

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hoff­mann: a lumi­nous-voiced, ado­les­cent Sen­ta who pass­es from the fresh­ness of youth to a matu­ri­ty ready to under­take the utmost sacrifice….”

Car­o­line Alexan­der, Webtheatre.fr

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann charges her singing with ener­gy tem­pered with delicacy….”

Emmanuel Dupuy, Diapason

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hofmann’s Sen­ta demon­strat­ed a bril­liant and fresh timbre….”

Bruno Ser­rou, La Croix/Classique d’aujourd’hui

“…sopra­no Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann cre­at­ed a Sen­ta of absolutes: con­sumed by love, she will go as far as the utmost sac­ri­fice to redeem the Dutchman.”

Philippe Ven­turi­ni, Les Echos

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann was the incor­po­ra­tion of a Sen­ta at once ecsta­t­ic and burn­ing with love.”

Anto­nio Mafra, Le Progrès

“Simon Neal, with his vel­vet-like voice, was a dra­mat­i­cal­ly well-con­struct­ed pro­tag­o­nist.  The same was true of the sen­si­tive Mag­dale­na Anna Hofmann.”

César López Rosell, El Periodico

“Excel­lent stage pres­ence from Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann (Sen­ta)….”

Pas­cale Clav­el, Le petit bulletin

“…sopra­no Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann impressed….”

Mari­cel Chavar­ria, La Vanguardia

“From Simon Neal’s Dutch­man to the Sen­ta of Mag­dale­na Anna Hofmann…each singer car­ries his or her role perfectly.”

Raphaël de Guber­natis, Le Nou­v­el Observateur

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann was thor­ough­ly engaged in the char­ac­ter of Senta….”

Alain Bœuf, l’Humanité

“It [the stag­ing] some­how worked, not least because Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann used her expe­ri­ence in the role of the Frau (Erwartung) to telling effect.”

Ger­hard Per­sché, Opera Mag­a­zine UK

“It was in the mon­odra­ma “Erwartung” (in Farad­sch Karaew’s ver­sion) that the ten­sion ulti­mate­ly reached its high­est point. The sopra­no Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann man­aged to car­ry the last third of the evening almost entire­ly by her­self through her stage pres­ence and superb han­dling of the text.”

Mar­i­on Eigl, Kurier

“The mon­odra­ma revolv­ing around the noc­tur­nal wan­der­ings of the Woman found its bright­ly shin­ing voice in Mag­dale­na Anna Hofmann…”

Wiener Zeitung

“Accord­ing to stage direc­tor Elis­a­beth Gabriel’s con­cept, the pro­tag­o­nist – rep­re­sent­ed by two per­form­ers at times appear­ing simul­ta­ne­ous­ly on stage – expe­ri­ences, as the very good mez­zo-sopra­no Ver­e­na Gunz, her sex­u­al awak­en­ing and its (real or unre­al) con­se­quences in the Book of the Hang­ing Gar­dens; in Erwartung sopra­no Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann rep­re­sents the now mature pro­tag­o­nist re-vis­it­ing her past. With­in the admit­ted­ly rarely enthralling the­atri­cal stag­ing Hof­mann emerges as the gen­uine trump card of the pro­duc­tion, thanks to her stage pres­ence and her glow­ing dra­mat­ic voice, which she employs with nuance and always com­pre­hen­si­ble dic­tion: a believ­able [Getriebene] with a heroine’s aplomb.”

Wal­ter Wei­dringer, Die Presse

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann with her deli­cious­ly pleas­ing sopra­no voice…”

Tirol­er Tageszeitung

“… Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann as The Woman with her sen­su­al, majes­tic sopra­no voice, able to trans­mit every imag­in­able emo­tion­al impulse or out­burst. Quite sim­ply an experience!”

Har­ald Lacina, Der Neue Merker

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann was float­ing some won­der­ful high notes that could reduce any­one to a state of entranced ado­ra­tion.” UK Opera Mag­a­zine, Peter Franklin

“And the voic­es! … rav­ish­ing, the exul­tant Car­lot­ta (Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann), who glad­ly dies a swift Liebestod.” Eleonore Bün­ing, Frank­furter All­ge­meine Zeitung

“[Charles] Work­man and Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann (Car­lot­ta) made the high­point of the entire work out of their Tris­tan-esque duet of the sec­ond act. Here Schreker’s so char­ac­ter­is­tic alter­na­tive world of a beau­ty that per­fects itself in intox­i­ca­tion and music blos­somed with irre­sistible radi­ance. Chris­t­ian Wild­ha­gen, Neue Zürcher Zeitung

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­man­n’s Car­lot­ta … is made tran­scen­dent by the radi­ant musi­cal­i­ty of the Ger­man singer.” Marie-Aude Roux, Le Monde

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann makes a con­ge­nial Car­lot­ta to Charles Work­man’s Alviano: one sens­es her con­tempt for soci­ety’s con­ven­tions just as much as her inner urge to paint. Hof­man­n’s ease in man­ag­ing both the length and the man­i­fold vocal demands of the role was appar­ent; it was beau­ti­ful­ly craft­ed, sung with aplomb, and in per­fect har­mo­ny with her sup­ple, nev­er clichéd act­ing.” Robert Quit­ta, Opera Lounge

“…we applaud the superb per­for­mance of the high­ly musi­cal Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann as Car­lot­ta.…” Bergrand Bolog­ne­si, Anaclase

“…this musi­cian trims her singing with a thou­sand nuances, giv­ing all of her­self, and tri­umphs in this role of an artist with a wound­ed heart who prefers to depict the beau­ty of souls rather than that of bod­ies.” Emmanuel Dupuy, Diapason

“And the voic­es! … rav­ish­ing, the exul­tant Car­lot­ta (Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann), who glad­ly dies a swift Liebestod.” Eleonore Bün­ing, Frank­furter All­ge­meine Zeitung

“The direc­tion of the singers was exem­plary and Bösch was lucky to have sopra­no Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann and bari­tone Simon Neal as Car­lot­ta and Tamare, after their suc­cess here in last sea­son’s Fly­ing Dutch­man… . The loose-limbed Hof­mann was con­vinc­ing as the hip con­tem­po­rary artist, with a Tracey Emin like enthu­si­asm for the per­ver­si­ty of desires.” Stephen J. Mudge, Opera News

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann was hard­ly a step behind him [Charles Hof­mann] as the rebel­lious painter Car­lot­ta, fly­ing in the face of bour­geois con­ven­tions.…” Robert Quit­ta, Der Neue Merker

“Car­lot­ta found in Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann a for­mi­da­bly invest­ed inter­preter, phys­i­cal­ly seduc­tive and of par­tic­u­lar­ly expres­sive accent.” Richard Martet, Opéra

“Sopra­no Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann … was a Car­lot­ta who delin­eat­ed all the nuances of her com­pli­cat­ed char­ac­ter.” Rosa Mas­sagué, El Periódico

“Mag­dale­na-Anna Hof­mann (Car­lot­ta) por­trayed her role in all its facets, sin­cer­i­ty and duplic­i­ty inex­tri­ca­bly mixed togeth­er.…” Frank Lan­glois, Resmusica.com

“…a reg­u­lar on the stage of the Opéra de Lyon, Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann lent Car­lot­ta a beau­ti­ful mix­ture of vig­or and fragili­ty.…” Nico­las Blan­mont, La libre belgique

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­man­n’s Car­lot­ta was nervy, com­mit­ted, strong and frag­ile at the same time: she embod­ied the char­ac­ter incon­testably, wear­ing her pas­sion on her sleeve, yet reveal­ing her­self at times to be reserved, ten­der. The singer man­aged to pro­pose very dif­fer­ent facets of the char­ac­ter, thanks as well to the pre­ci­sion of David Bösch’s stage direc­tion.” Blog du Wanderer

“The sopra­no Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann was a Car­lot­ta wor­thy of [Charles Work­man’s Alviano], …of a depth and emo­tion­al sen­si­tiv­i­ty of remark­able imme­di­a­cy.” Bruno Ser­rou, Clas­sique d’ajourd’hui

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann was appeal­ing as Car­lot­ta… .” Robert Jung­wirth, Klassikinfo.de “Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann impressed as Car­lot­ta, a dif­fi­cult role that has to reach some nearim­pos­si­ble heights, and … she brought a degree of per­son­al­i­ty to the work’s com­plex artis­tic female char­ac­ter.” Oper­a­Jour­nal

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann suc­ceeds in con­vinc­ing­ly per­son­i­fy­ing a young artist who brings by turns the great­est joy and the worst of mis­for­tune to him who sin­cere­ly loves her.” Elodie Mar­tinez, toutelaculture.com

“Astound­ing for her expres­sive inten­si­ty and con­cen­tra­tion, Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann repro­duced the most minute inflec­tions of the heart and voice of Car­lot­ta in all her com­plex­i­ty.” Philippe Ven­turi­ni, LesEchos.fr

The stage pres­ence of all the singers should be point­ed out, as well, at the fore­front of whom were the Car­lot­ta of Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann and the Tamare of Simon Neal – who inter­pret­ed Sen­ta and the Hol­lan­der in Lyon’s pro­duc­tion of the Fly­ing Dutch­man last autumn. Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann gave an intense dra­mat­ic dimen­sion to her char­ac­ter of an artist con­front­ed first with her alter-ego (Alviano), then with absolute oth­er­ness (Tamare). In the scene in her stu­dio, in which she explains in detail her vision of the strange hands that she paints, there was rel­e­vance to her choice of an inter­pre­ta­tion more Expres­sion­is­tic than lyri­cal, even if this cen­tral scene might also have been approached as a moment of pure poet­ry. Fab­rice Malka­ni, Forumopera.com

The sub­tle changes that take place with­in the psy­che of the artist often go by unno­ticed. Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann, a fab­u­lous actress who one regrets had nev­er crossed paths with Patrice Chéreau, reveals their most inti­mate vari­a­tions. Unavoid­ably trans­formed into an inde­pen­dent artist with a hint of punk about her, she left in the cup­board the dis­guise with which David Bösch decked her out: it was her ges­tures, her glances, and her inflec­tions which embod­ied all the com­plex­i­ty of the char­ac­ter. Jean-Charles Hof­felé, Concertclassic.com

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann, Sen­ta in the Fly­ing Dutch­man in the sea­son’s open­ing, guar­an­teed the demand­ing role of Car­lot­ta.…” Gilles Char­lassier, Concertonet

“Onstage, the irre­proach­able the­atri­cal direc­tion echoed the vocal engage­ment of the inter­preters in the midst of so chal­leng­ing a test as this score presents. Par­tic­u­lar­ly of note in this regard were Charles Work­man, Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann, Simon Neal, and Markus Mar­quardt, who formed the work’s win­ning quar­tet.” Anto­nio Mafra, Le Progrès

“The total suc­cess of the per­for­mance owed much to a first-class cast, with the pow­er trio of Charles Work­man (Alviano), Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann (Car­lot­ta), and Simon Neal (Tamare) as con­vinc­ing vocal­ly as the­atri­cal­ly.” Jean Reverdy, Le Dauphiné

Copenhagen | Birmingham | Berlin

“There was a sim­i­lar inti­ma­cy to Schoenberg’s Erwär­tung – notwith­stand­ing the dark beau­ty and lus­trous tone of Mag­dale­na Anna Hofmann’s voice, and the con­trolled ten­sion with which she unfold­ed Schoenberg’s great psy­cho­log­i­cal dra­ma. The RDO dart­ed and shim­mered around her to the man­ner born: this is where that opera pit expe­ri­ence pays dividends.”
Richard Brat­by, Birm­ing­ham Post

“Exact­ly so was Mag­dale­na Anna Hofmann’s sov­er­eign inter­pre­ta­tion of Schoenberg’s sear­ing dra­ma, Erwartung [– as of a per­son about to come apart at the seams]. She made a last­ing impres­sion with her focused dra­mat­ic voice and a super­abun­dance of expres­sive abil­i­ty. “Expec­ta­tion” would be the trans­la­tion of the title, and that is exact­ly what it was: long-endured, oppres­sive ten­sion as an almost unbear­able state of mind. For half an hour she sang about her beloved, who nev­er came, out in the dark for­est, which looked noth­ing like itself and deceived the sens­es. Musi­cal­ly the dra­ma was high­ly unpre­dictable. With no fixed points of ref­er­ence, Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann guid­ed the audi­ence through the con­vo­lu­tions of The Woman’s mind – a series of explo­sions of pow­er­less­ness, pen­sive­ness, anx­i­ety, rage, and ecstasy.”
Hen­rik Frøs, Poli­tiken (Den­mark)

“Last night Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann abrupt­ly joined the ranks of my favorite singers [Anja Sil­ja and Angela Denoke] (in what else but Schön­berg’s Erwartung)! Her young voice peals like a bell, her act­ing abil­i­ties are sug­ges­tive, and the com­pre­hen­si­bil­i­ty of her dic­tion is extra­or­di­nary – in short, an ide­al inter­preter for the role of a woman ren­dered com­plete­ly mad by a moon­light addic­tion, with a (some­what) under­stand­able atti­tude of expectan­cy for her near­ly unseen but mani­a­cal­ly adored lover, for her­self in the midst of her break­down, and for her own uncon­trol­lable, ‘per­fect­ly nor­mal’ life.”
Andre Sokolows­ki, Der Freitag

“The Pol­ish-born sopra­no Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann is famil­iar with this kind of nervy reper­toire (her cred­its include the edgy, dream-haunt­ed Moth­er in Dal­lapic­co­la’s Il Pri­gion­iero and the seduced, con­sump­tive Car­lot­ta in Schrek­er’s Die Geze­ich­neten). She sang the role hero­ical­ly, from mem­o­ry: a force­ful, apt and dri­ven performance.”
Roder­ic Dun­nett, Bachtrack

“Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann, singing from mem­o­ry, revealed a strong and char­ac­ter­ful voice with a rich mid­dle reg­is­ter allied to a rather metal­lic top range, which suit­ed the character’s fluc­tu­at­ing moods and tran­sient thoughts of warmth, jeal­ousy, anx­i­ety, resolve and deep despair. Her per­for­mance was inter­nalised allow­ing one to focus on the text (a shame there were no sur­titles). Hof­mann has excel­lent dic­tion how­ev­er – a real plus! Thanks to Boder’s sym­pa­thet­ic con­duct­ing, the orches­tra pro­vid­ed wash­es of sound with­out over­whelm­ing the singer. Erwartung is an unset­tling piece and best expe­ri­enced live – and here exert­ed its curi­ous magic.”
Alexan­der Camp­bell, Clas­si­cal Source

“Schoenberg’s Erwartung was per­formed. Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann sang: easy to under­stand, tech­ni­cal­ly mas­ter­ful, main­tain­ing with ease the mid­dle ground between heat­ed expres­sion and beau­ty of tone.”
Anton Schlatz, Opern- & Konz­ertkri­tik Berlin

“The piece is a nat­ur­al for an opera orches­tra, of course, and Boder and the RDO dart­ed, shim­mered and swirled under and around Hofmann’s dark, lus­trous voice with­out a false step. Hof­mann her­self told Schoen­berg and Pappenheim’s hor­ror sto­ry with cool con­trol; as the impli­ca­tions of the words flashed across her face, she nev­er forced her tone or descend­ed into melo­dra­ma – mak­ing her short, sud­den bursts of vocal char­ac­ter­i­sa­tion all the more pow­er­ful. A ghoul­ish­ly rolled “r” here, a low hint of a snarl there: this per­for­mance was both intense­ly beau­ti­ful and unspar­ing­ly hon­est. On the opera stage, it would have been devastating.”
Richard Brat­by, The Arts Desk

“The out­stand­ing sopra­no Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann sang clear­ly and fer­vent­ly, with fran­ti­cal­ly agi­tat­ed feel­ing. The lis­ten­er trem­bles and is filled with appre­hen­sion along with her char­ac­ter, as though it were Puc­ci­ni, despite the crude text and hys­ter­i­cal psy­chodra­ma filled with ellip­ti­cal “…” like Robert Musil’s Ver­wand­lun­gen. What a pity that Schoen­berg did not write an aton­al Manon.”
Hundert11 – Konz­ert­gänger in Berlin

“[This music is] late-Roman­tic up to its ears, and the Pol­ish soloist Mag­dale­na Anna Hof­mann was appro­pri­ate­ly the­atri­cal with her voice, well respect­ing the style.”
Sune Ander­berg, Klassisk.org

“Hof­mann is capa­ble of great dra­mat­ic expres­sion, with an impres­sive vocal range, and clear­ly placed her­self in the poor woman’s sit­u­a­tion. … For me the prize went to Mag­dale­na Hof­mann. I did not know her before, but now I am going to fol­low her career – accord­ing to the pro­gram her reper­toire includes Wag­n­er, under­stand­ably, and I look for­ward to hear­ing her as Kundry one day.”
Concertanten

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