He had an extraordinary vocal range of four and a half octaves, ranging from the soprano to bass registers.
His brother Horst Rippert, nine years his senior, confirmed that he had shot down the Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, the famous French author of "The Little Prince", in 1944 (March 2008).
Lived in the small town Zell-Weierbach near Offenburg in Germany and
also on on the Sporade Island of Skopelos, Greece since the 1960s.
He has performed over 6,000 concerts in his career including a two year
six-days-a-week stint at the French Ppera singing, among other greats,
"The Fiddler on the Roof".
Holds Greek citizenship.
Born to an German engineer and his wife, who was Russian, according to the singer.
He had a long career as a singer in France, where he passed himself as Russian, and always wore Russian fur hats onstage. He was also fluent in French, which he spoke with only a slight accent.