Born in
Lauterach,
Bavaria, Ludwig received voice lessons in Munich from Luise Willer and Rudolf Hartmann, and also from
Franziska Martienssen-Lohmann. In 1951, she was invited by
Wieland Wagner to perform at the first
Bayreuth Festival after World War II. She appeared as Fricka, Rossweiße and Wellgunde in
Der Ring des Nibelungen and as a flower maiden as well as a squire in
Parsifal. The following year, she was Waltraute in
Die Walküre instead of Fricka. Her next engagement was at the
Deutsche Oper am Rhein, where she was engaged from 1952. At
La Scala in Milan, she appeared as Waltraute in
Die Walküre in 1955 and as a page in
Salome in 1956. At the
Vienna State Opera, she gave guest performances from 1956 to 1962, as Octavian in
Der Rosenkavalier and as the composer in
Ariadne auf Naxos, both by Richard Strauss, and as Iocasta in Stravinsky's
Oedipus Rex. Further guest performances led her to the
Teatro San Carlo (1952), at
La Fenice in Venice, to Amsterdam, Zurich (1955 as Clairon in
Capriccio), Barcelona, Dublin, and Geneva. In 1958 she gave a guest performance in
Ariadne auf Naxos at the
Holland Festival. From 1959 to 1968, she belonged to the ensemble of the
Cologne Opera. On 23 November 1959, she took part in the world premiere of
Nicolas Nabokov's ''Rasputin's End''. Guest performances took her to the opera houses of Washington, D.C. and the
Teatro Lirico Giuseppe Verdi, among others. Roles in Ludwig's repertoire were Dorabella in Mozart's
Così fan tutte, Orfeo in Gluck's
Orfeo ed Euridice, Cherubino in Mozart's
Le nozze di Figaro, Ortrud in Wagner's
Lohengrin, Brangäne in
Tristan und Isolde, Kundry in
Parsifal, Clairon in
Capriccio by Richard Strauss, Baroness Grünwiesel in Henze's
Der junge Lord, Eboli in Verdi's
Don Carlos, the title role in Bizet's
Carmen, and Nicklausse in Offenbach's ''
Hoffmann's Erzählungen''. In concert, she sang the alto solo in Mozart's
Requiem at the
Salzburg Festival in 1963. She was known as a
lieder singer worldwide, touring the Americas and Japan and other parts of Asia. Ludwig retired from the stage in 1968. She then taught at the Ankara Academy of Music and from 1971 at the
Mozarteum in Salzburg, where she was appointed professor in 1983. In 1987, she held master classes in Manila and Hong Kong. Ludwig died in Salzburg at the age of 96. == References ==