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Spanish conductor and violinist Roberto González-Monjas is rapidly making a mark on the international scene. His current titled positions are Chief Conductor of Musikkollegium Winterthur in Switzerland, Chief Conductor and Artistic Advisor of Sweden’s Dalasinfoniettan, a designate Principal Guest Conductor of the Belgian National Orchestra (from 2022/23 season) and a Music Director of the Orquesta Iberacademy in Colombia. He also nurtures a strong relationship with Orquesta Sinfónica de Castilla y León in his home town Valladolid, where he conducts several times a season. Acclaimed recent guest conducting and play-direct debuts include collaborations with the Mozarteumorchester Salzburg and Camerata Salzburg, Orchestre National Bordeaux Aquitaine, Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg, Orquesta Sinfónica de Galicia and Orchestre national d’Île-de-France among many others.
Alexandra Conunova won in 2012 the first distinction of the Joseph Joachim of Hanover’s international violin competition : impressed by her master technique and her sensitivity, the jury unanimously commended her virtuosity. In 2015 ; while she was rewarded at the Singapour’s International Competition, she reached the final step of the prestigious Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, where she won the third prize – the first prize having remained non awarded – before becoming the 2016’s BorlettiBuittoni Fellowship laureate in London.
From then on, Alexandra makes it a rule as a leading soloist and performs alongside important orchestra such as Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Orchestra de la Svizzera Italiana, NDR Hannover, Radio Saarbrück, Mariinski Orchestra, Camerata Bern, Orchestre du Teatro Regio de Turin, Orchestre de Seville, Orchestre de Toulouse, Stuttgart and Vienna chamber orchestras, under the direction of Valery Gergiev, Theodor Curentzis, John Axelrod, Vladmir Spivakov, G. Noseda, …touring in Japan with the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra and Yuri Simonov, or even recently touring with Laurence Equilbey and her Insula Orchestra – Budapest, Aix en Provence, Paris, London.
Alexandra performs also in various festivals, such as Verbier, Montreux Septembre Musical, Gstaad, BBC London, Ferrara Musica, Accademia Santa Cecilia Roma, Hamburg Martha Argerich Festival, Bonn, Colmar, Menton, Radio France Montpellier, Aix-en -Provence Festival de Pâques, les Folles Journées de Nantes and Tokyo…and chamber music with Michail Lifits, Renaud Capuçon, Edgar Moreau, David Kadouch, Andreas Ottensamer, Gérard Caussé, Boris Brovtsyn, Jean Rondeau…
Appointed « Maitre ès Arts » by the Republic of Moldavia’s President, her native, country, she founded the charity « ArtaVie » , aiming to help disadvantaged families and children from her former school.
Discography : Prokofiev’s violon and piano sonatas with Michail Lifits (Aparté) . and the Beethoven’s Triple Concerto in C major op. 56 with the Insula orchestra under Laurence Equilbey, (Erato). Alexandra plays a « del Gesu » ca.1730 « von Vecsey ».
Canadian violinist Timothy Chooi’s recent honours include Second Prize at the prestigious Queen Elisabeth Competition in Brussels in 2019, and First Prize at Germany’s 2018 Joseph Joachim International Violin Competition. 2018 was also the year he won the Verbier Festival’s Prix Yves Paternot for the Academy’s most promising and accomplished musician, leading to his solo debut here this year. Other 2021/22 highlights include a return to the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, a Concertgebouw debut with Phion orchestra, and a debut with the DSO Berlin. Chooi is on the Juilliard’s Artist Diploma program studying with Catherine Cho, and is a Professional Studies candidate at the Kronberg Academy with Christian Tetzlaff. He’s also a Professor of Violin at the University of Ottawa. He performs on the 1717 Windsor-Weinstein Stradivarius on loan from the Canada Council for the Arts.
Born in Tel Aviv, violinist Guy Braunstein studied with Chaim Taub before moving to New York to work with Glenn Dicterow and Pinchas Zukerman. At a very young age, he performed as a soloist and chamber musician and accumulated a wide range of prestigious partners, accompanying the greatest international orchestras and conductors. In 2000 he became the youngest concertmaster of the Berlin Philharmonic, a position he held for 12 years before leaving to pursue his solo career. Artist-in-Residence with the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra for the 2017/18 season and with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra for the 2019/20 season, he is also developing a rich career as a conductor, touring regularly. The Israeli plays a rare violin by Francesco Ruggieri (1679).
Hungarian violinist Kristóf Baráti is recognised increasingly across the globe as a musician of extraordinary quality with a vast expressive range and impeccable technique. In 2014, at the age of 35, Baráti was awarded Hungary’s highest cultural award, the Kossuth Prize, following in the footsteps of revered Hungarian artists such as András Schiff, György Ligeti and Iván Fischer. Applauded repeatedly for the poetry and eloquence that he brings to his playing, he has been described as “a true tonal aesthete of the highest order”.
In recent seasons, Baráti has performed at the Hollywood Bowl with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, at London’s Royal Festival Hall with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and in 2019 he was the featured soloist in the opening concert of the Verbier Festival. Baráti has played with orchestras such as Zurich Tonhalle, Oslo Philharmonic, Orchestre National de France, ORF Vienna Radio Symphony, BBC Scottish Symphony, BBC Philharmonic and Hague Philharmonic orchestras. He performs regularly with Gergiev and the Mariinsky Orchestra both in Russia and on tour around the world including in the US and China. Highlights of his 19/20 season include debuts with the Orchestre Symphonique de Montreal, Hallé Orchestra, Haydn Orchestra and at Zarydye Hall with the Moscow State Symphony Orchestra.
A regular recital and chamber music player, Baráti has performed with partners such as Mischa Maisky, Bashmet, Pace, Bavouzet, Kocsis and Kashkashian amongst others. He performs every year at the White Nights Festival and in 2019 made his debut at the Seattle Chamber Music and Aspen Festivals. In 2016 he made a sensational debut at the Verbier Festival when he performed the complete solo Sonatas and Partitas of Bach, and has since been back every year. Recital highlights in 2019/20 include a tour of North America including performances in New York City and Washington and his debut at Mexico’s International Festival Cervantino.
Baráti has an extensive discography which includes the five Mozart concerti, the complete Beethoven and Brahms sonatas with Klára Würtz, and Ysaÿe solo sonatas for Brilliant Classics, and Bach’s Sonatas and Partitas for Solo violin on the Berlin Classics label. Of his disc of encores “The Soul of Lady Harmsworth” recorded in 2016, Gramophone magazine said “for those who like to hear the violin played at its sweet and acrobatic best, then Baráti is out of the top drawer.”
Having spent much of his childhood in Venezuela, where he played as soloist with many of the country’s leading orchestras, Baráti returned to Budapest to study at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music and was later mentored by Eduard Wulfson, himself a student of Milstein and Menuhin. Still resident in Budapest, Baráti performs regularly across Hungary and together with István Vardái, Baráti is Artistic Director of the Kaposvár International Chamber Music Festival. Baráti plays the 1703 “Lady Harmsworth” Stradivarius, by kind arrangement with the Stradivarius Society of Chicago.
source: https://kristofbarati.com/about/