Susanne Serfling completed her singing studies at the Hanns Eisler Music Academy in Berlin, after her ballet training. As the winner of the German National Singing Competition (2000), she performed as a guest artist during her studies, including roles such as Pamina, Papagena, Adele and The Swan Princess at the Berlin State Opera, the Komische Oper Berlin and the Konzerthaus Berlin. After her first permanent engagement at the Theater Erfurt, the soprano joined the ensemble at the Darmstadt State Theater in 2005.
After title roles such as Poppea, Ifigenia, Kluge and Anne Frank, she made her successful debut in the lyric-dramatic repertoire as Rachel in Jubilee. She achieved further highlights as Katya Kabanova, Mimi in La Bohème and Sieglinde in Die Walküre. She also sang Cio-Cio San in Madama Butterfly, Giorgetta, Suor Angelica, Salome and Desdemona for the first time at the Darmstadt State Theater. Her guest appearances have taken her to venues such as the Salzburg Festival, Opera di Roma, the National Theater Mannheim and the Deutsche Oper am Rhein.
Since 2014 she has worked freelance and expanded her repertoire to include roles such as Agathe in Der Freischütz, Blanche in Die Gespräche der Karmeliterinnen, Chysothemis in Elektra, Leonore in Fidelio, Marie/Marietta in Die tote Stadt, Senta in Der fliegende Holländer, Ariadne in Ariadne, Fidelio/Leonore and Salome, Minnie in La fanciulla del West. Guest appearances have taken her to venues including the state theatres of Wiesbaden, Cottbus, Oldenburg, and Braunschweig, the Bonn Opera, the Wuppertal Opera, and the theatres of Magdeburg, Kiel, Ulm, Heidelberg, Erfurt, Koblenz, Aachen, Hof, and Detmold. Her career has been shaped by collaborations with conductors such as Stefan Soltesz, Michail Jurowski, Stefan Blunier, Will Humburg, Gerd Albrecht, Ralf Weickert, and Riccardo Muti, and directors such as Harry Kupfer, Georg Tabori, Peter Konwitschny, John Dew, Philipp Kochheim, Vera Nemirova, Eva Christian Göus Dieckma, Lotyr, and Markus Kraus.
Since her debut as Salome, Susanne Serfling has interpreted the title role in five new productions at the Staatstheater Darmstadt, Theater Magdeburg, Theater Hagen, Malmö Opera, Teatr Wielki Warsaw and Musiktheater Gelsenkirchen. Most recently, she has appeared as Ortlinde in Die Walküre at the Oldenburg Opera and Zurich Opera House, as Cio-Cio San at Theater Lübeck and as Senta in Der fliegende Holländer at Musiktheater Gelsenkirchen.
Since her debut as Salome, Susanne Serfling has interpreted the title role in five new productions at the Staatstheater Darmstadt, Theater Magdeburg, Theater Hagen, Malmö Opera, Teatr Wielki Warsaw and Musiktheater Gelsenkirchen. Susanne Serfling also has an active concert schedule with works by Weill, Mahler, Strauss, Puccini and Verdi, and has accepted invitations from Tonhalle Zürich, Crossound Festival Alaska, USA and Mexico.