Kurt Moll (born April 11, 1938) is a German operatic bass. Moll was born in Buir, near Cologne, Germany. As a child, he played the cello and hoped to become a great cellist. He also sang in the school choir, and the conductor encouraged him to concentrate on singing. He studied voice at the Köln Hochschule für Musik with Emmy Müller. He joined the Cologne Opera at 20 and remained until 1961. He then sang for three years in Mainz and five years in Wuppertal. In 1969, he accepted an engagement with the Hamburg State Opera, and he then sang in all the major opera houses of Europe. He made his US debut with the San Francisco Opera as Gurnemanz in Richard Wagner's Parsifal in 1974. His Metropolitan Opera debut followed four years later, when he sang the Landgraf in Tannhäuser, Rocco in Fidelio, and Sparafucile in Rigoletto. From that time he has performed all over the world. He retired from stage in 2006. His last performance was the role of Nachtwächter in Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg in the Münchner Opern-Festspiele. He has made innumerable recordings with many of the great conductors. In 1991, he won a Grammy Award for his recording of Das Rheingold. He lives in Cologne with his family.
