Waltraud Meier (born January 9, 1956) is a Grammy-award winning German mezzo-soprano. She is particularly known for her Wagnerian roles as Kundry, Isolde, Ortrud, Venus and Sieglinde, but has also had success in the French and Italian repertoire appearing as Eboli, Amneris, Carmen and Santuzza. She resides in Munich. Meier has performed in the world’s famed opera houses (including La Scala, Covent Garden, Metropolitan Opera, the Vienna State Opera, the Bavarian State Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, and Colón Theater). She has performed under the batons of the world's great conductors, including Riccardo Muti, Daniel Barenboim, Claudio Abbado, James Levine, Lorin Maazel, Zubin Mehta, and Giuseppe Sinopoli. She has been named a "Kammersängerin" by both the Bavarian State Opera in Munich and the Vienna State Opera, and "Commandeur" of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French Government. Waltraud Meier was born in Würzburg, Germany. She sang in numerous choral groups during her younger years. Upon finishing her secondary education, she began graduate studies in English and Romance Languages while also taking voice lessons. She studied singing with Professor Dietger Jacob. In 1976, she decided to concentrate on a singing career and soon thereafter debuted at the Würzburg Opera as Lola in Cavalleria Rusticana. Over the next several years she performed regularly at the opera house in Mannheim (1976-1978) <a href="https://www.last.fm/music/Waltraud+Meier">Read more on Last.fm</a>. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.