Klaus Nomi: the East Village’s Intergalactic Opera Singer
If you were to walk down East 4th Street in the late 1970s, you might come across an ethereal, white-faced character in a flamboyant costume, a spectacle among spectacles. Klaus Nomi (January 24, 1944 – August 6, 1983), a striking and enterprising countertenor, made his mark on experimental music and performance amidst countless other countercultural figures who surrounded him in the East Village at the time.

Klaus Nomi was born Klaus Sperber in Bavaria, Germany in 1944. He loved classical music and longed to perform in a German opera company. He worked as a cleaner in local theaters while attending a performing arts school in Berlin, but found it difficult to break into the elite and very traditional community of performers in his homeland. He had not yet found his unique voice and androgynous persona, but he already knew that the opera would not love him as much as he loved it. When his friends introduced him to American rock and roll, he decided to move to New York City and find a creative scene that would accept him.
In New York, he met fellow German immigrant Gabriele La Feri, who helped him find a place to live. The two became roommates in a ground floor apartment on Carmine Street, and began hosting parties for other aspiring artists. At that point he was training as a tenor, but he was far more interested in singing as a countertenor (considered the soprano range for female singers). His voice teacher was skeptical — there were virtually no male singers performing in such a high range at the time. Both his teacher and his friends advised him against singing as a countertenor, because they worried that he would not be taken seriously. But Klaus loved the drama of a high range. He would sometimes pretend to be Maria Callas when singing, and began emulating her dramatic soprano and commanding stage presence.
To support himself in New York, Klaus worked at a grocery store, then a bakery, and at one point had his own small baking business. By night, he performed at the ‘New-Wave Vaudeville’ show hosted at the nearby Irving Plaza performance venue. It was during this time that he began crafting the Klaus Nomi persona. ‘Klaus Nomi’ was an otherworldly being, one who didn’t abide by human laws of gender or nationality. He said that he chose the name ‘Nomi’ because of its universality and ambiguity — a name with no inherent meaning, through which he could create his own story.

Klaus eventually moved to an apartment on St. Mark’s Place and met musician Kristian Hoffman. Hoffman saw great potential in Nomi and formed a band with several other artists, with Nomi as the lead singer and front person. With like-minded musicians supporting him, Nomi was able to pursue his interests in both opera and rock music.
They began performing around the neighborhood in whichever night clubs would have them. One such club was the iconic Pyramid Club at 101 Avenue A. Audiences were astounded by Nomi, and sometimes did not believe what they were seeing or hearing. Management would often brief the audience that what they were hearing was not a lipsync performance, but live vocals performed by Nomi. When they weren’t performing live, the band began to take their musical artistry more seriously. Hoffman had a friend who worked at Electric Lady Studios, who would allow them to record songs in secret.

Nomi met David Bowie while partying in the East Village. Bowie invited Nomi and his friend Joey Arias to perform with him on Saturday Night Live in 1979. Nomi and Bowie mutually inspired one another. Nomi adopted his signature look, an exaggerated Weimar-style suit made of vinyl, after the similar suit that Bowie wore during this performance.

In 1980, after gaining national recognition through SNL, they recorded and released their first entire album at the studio, entitled Klaus Nomi. The album included Nomi’s now-famous covers of Lou Christie’s ‘Lightning Strikes’ and Lesley Gore’s ‘You Don’t Own Me,’ as well as the original ‘Nomi Song,’ which introduced listeners to the entity that was Klaus Nomi.
Nomi eventually parted ways with his band and began performing as a solo artist, releasing several more albums. He was working on his third studio album in 1983, when he was diagnosed with AIDS. Nomi passed away that year at Memorial Sloan Kettering Hospital Center. He was one of the first well-known queer artists to die of the disease. He was 39 years old.
Many have speculated that Nomi would have gone on to become a much greater household name had he been given the chance, and they are probably correct. He has certainly inspired other artists who share his intense musicality and appreciation for high drama and imaginative androgyny. Lady Gaga, who walked many of the same local streets and frequented many of the same local venues as Nomi two decades later, lists him as one of her greatest inspirations.