 Her voice was featured in a key scene of the film, "The Shawshank Redemption", joining with that of Gundula Janowitz in a duet from "Le Nozze di Figaro", "soar[ing] over a prison yard, signifying joy and hope in a world of despair," according to a 2014 article in "The New York Times".Mathis was born, and studied, in Lucerne, and made her operatic debut in 1956 as the second boy in "Die Zauberflöte".She continued gaining stage experience in her native Switzerland for the next three years.