© Gerard Spee
The Rumanian violinist Corina Belcea has performed as a soloist and orchestra musician in Europe and the Far East, in venues such as St. John Smith Square,
Queen Elisabeth Hall, Barbican Hall, Purcell Room, Théâtre du Châtelet and Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, where she joined members of the Alban Berg Quartet for a perfomance.
She is a founding member of the Belcea Quartet which is now resident quartet at the Vienna Konzerthaus and the new Boulez Hall in Berlin. Corinna Belcea has held a violin and chamber music professorship at the Hochschule der Kunste Bern since 2011.
Hatto Beyerle, born in Frankfurt am Main, instigated and founded the Alban Berg Quartet and other chamber music groups. He was Professor for Viola and Chamber Music at the Vienna University for Music and the Performing Arts and since 1987 he has performed the same function at the University for Music and Drama in Hanover as well as at the University for Music in the town of Basel. Since 1998 he has been at the Scuola di Musica di Fiesole (Florence). He is Artistic Director of the ECMA European Chamber Music Academy.
Photo: Gerard Spee
Born in Beirut, Avo Kuyumjian began his studies when he was 12 years old at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Vienna. He was the youngest student at the time majoring in piano performance. His career as an artist performer, professor, director, and administrator is marked by the many accomplishments he has achieved in the field of music since he won the first price at the Sixth International Beethoven Competition in Vienna in 1981. Since then he has performed in well renowned concert halls worldwide. He has been a soloist with well renowned orchestras around the world and taken part in many different festivals. He is a sought out juror in major international competitions in addition to conducting master classes in many universities in Europe and Japan. His recordings well demonstrate his artistry as a pianist and a chamber musician. He is the initiator and founder of the International Joseph Haydn Chamber Music Competition and became the cofounder and director of the Joseph Haydn Chamber Music Institute at the mdw.
The qualified piano pedagogue and pianist of the Boulanger Trio, Karla Haltenwanger, already won First Prizes at solo and chamber music competitions at a young age. As the First Prize winner of «Jugend musiziert» she was selected to perform works by composers from Theresienstadt in the Czech Republic, Poland, Israel and Switzerland. Besides that, she performed as a soloist with various European orchestras. She has been an active concert performer nationally and internationally, e.g. at the Berlin Philharmonic, the Wigmore Hall, Cologne Philharmonic, Laeiszhalle, Salzburg Mozarteum, Festspielhaus Baden-Baden and many more. Together with the Boulanger Trio, Karla Haltenwanger developed their own concert series, the «Boulangerie» that will also be performed at the Sunday matinee on 14 May.
Diana Ligeti, cellist, attended the International Menuhin Music Academy in Gstaad. She was a finalist in the prestigious Munich Competition in 1992, won First Grand Prize at the Douai International Cello Competition the same year and, in 1996, she won First Prize at the International Chamber Music Competition in Osaka as a member of the Ligeti String Trio. Since then, Diana Ligeti has performed as a soloist and chamber musician around the world. Her two most recent CDs with the Ensemble Musique Oblique was rated with highest honors by the French press. She is also a regular member of the ensemble Calliopée. In addition to her performance activities, Diana Ligeti teaches side reading for strings at the Conservatoire National Superieur de Musique in Paris.
Johannes Meissl is professor for chamber music and head of the Joseph Haydn Department of Chamber Music, Early Music and Contemporary Music at Vienna’s University of Music and Performing Arts – mdw. He is the Artistic director of isa (International Summer Academy of the mdw). He also gives master classes at numerous renowned schools and summer academies such as CNSM Paris, Guildhall School of Music and Drama London, Tokyo Geidai and Casals Festival Prades, to name a few. As a member of the Artis Quartet he took the opportunity for further studies with the LaSalle Quartet in the USA. After several prizes at international competitions the quartet became a regular at the world’s most important music centres and festivals from New York to Tokyo. Numerous prizes for over 30 recordings (such as Grand Prix du Disque, Diapason d’Or, Deutscher Schallplattenpreis Echo etc.) and more. Beside the quartet work Johannes Meissl appears in recitals and as a soloist as well as at numerous chamber music festivals. He is co-initiator of numerous international projects in the field of chamber music and shares with Hatto Beyerle the function of Artistic Director of the ECMA.
In his early years, pianist Stefan Mendl appeared regularly as a soloist in Austria and abroad. He was a founding member of the Vienna Piano Trio in 1988 which after studies with artists like the Trio di Trieste, the Haydn Trio-Wien, the Beaux Arts Trio, Isaac Stern, Jaime Laredo and members of the Guarneri Quartet soon became one of Europes foremost chamber ensembles. Since then the ensemble has appeared in literally most of the major chamber music venues in Europe and overseas and published numerous acclaimed CD recordings. Stefan Mendl appears frequently in duo recitals with cellist Clemens Hagen. He was giving masterclasses at Wigmore Hall, the Royal College of Music in London, the Toronto Summer Music Academy as well as in the United States.
Finnish violinist Minna Pensola performes extensively as a chamber musician and soloist collaborating with conductors such as Sakari Oramo, Olari Elts, Eva Ollikainen and John Storgårds. She is a founding member of the most internationally successful Finnish string quartet Meta4 which is the first prize winner of the Dimitri Shostakovich String Quartet Competition (Moscow 2004) and the Joseph Haydn Chamber Music Competition (Vienna 2007). Minna Pensola is a co-founder of The Punavuori Chamber Music Society and runs a club for classical music in her home town Helsinki. She teaches violin at the Sibelius Academy and has also acted as an artistic director of the Sysmä Summer Sounds Festival in Finland during the years 2006-2012.
At the age of 16, Vida Vujic began her studies at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Graz. She obtained her second master’s degree with honours at the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna - mdw in 2010. Since 2014, Vida Vujic is teaching as an assistant to Prof. Johannes Meissl at the Joseph Haydn Institute for Chamber Music, Early Music and New Music at the mdw as well as at the isa International Summer Academy. She is a winner of first and second prizes at multiple international competitions in Serbia, Italy and Austria and has played numerous concerts as a soloist as well as with chamber music ensembles in Europe and South America (e.g. at the 'Strings only' Festival in Croatia, the International Cello Festival in Belgrade, the Styriarte in Graz, the halls of the Vienna Konzerthaus and the Vienna Musikverein, the Grazer Liszt-Hall, and the Salle Pleyel in Paris). She made recordings for radio and TV, such as for the ORF. Her repertoire includes more than 240 works.
