 After being honorably discharged with a financial bonus, he entered the Hochschule für Musik Karlsruhe where he was trained as an opera singer.Hofmann made his professional opera debut in 1972 as Tamino in Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's "The Magic Flute" at Theater Lübeck.He sang his first Siegmund in Richard Wagner's "Die Walküre", a role which he became closely associated with, at the Wuppertal Opera in 1974.