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Franco-Dutch violist, Sào Soulez Larivière, is quickly building himself an international career as a versatile musician. Already at the age of 21, he is a top prizewinner of several international competitions, including the International Max Rostal Competition (DE, 2019 – 2nd Prize), the Cecil Aronowitz International Viola Competition (UK, 2017 – 3rd Prize), and the International Johannes Brahms Competition (AT, 2017 – 3rd Prize).
He has been featured in prestigious music festivals including the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival, the Menuhin Festival Gstaad, the Kronberg Academy Festival and the Verbier Academy Festival. In addition to making numerous solo appearances across Europe, he loves playing chamber music, having performed in festivals such as the Elba Isola Musicale d‘Europa (IT), Hamburger Kammermusikfest (DE), Krzyzowa-Music Festival (PL) and “Chamber Music Connects the World” in Kronberg (DE).
Soulez Larivière’s passion for broadening the viola repertoire has led him to arrange several works for the instrument. He often performs along with his sister, violinist Cosima Soulez Larivière, with whom he also enjoys playing his own arrangements (like ‘The Carnaval of Venice’ by N.Paganini).
Born in Paris, Sào Soulez Larivière originally started playing the violin at a very young age. He was awarded a scholarship at just the age of eight to study in the class of Natasha Boyarsky at the Yehudi Menuhin School (UK). Having discovered the viola whilst playing both chamber music and orchestra there, he decided to fully devote himself to the instrument by 2016. In addition to his early education, Soulez Larivière’s musical development has been enriched by working with world renowned musicians, such as Gerard Caussé, Nobuko Imai, Steven Isserlis, Gabor Tacács-Nagy, among others.
He is generously supported by scholarships from the Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes, Yehudi Menuhin ‘Live Music Now’ Berlin e.V. Foundation, as well as the ‘Villa Musicaʼ Foundation and in 2019, was awarded the prestigious ‘Ritter-Prize’ in Hamburg on behalf of the Oscar and Vera Ritter Stiftung.
Sào Soulez Larivière resides in Berlin where he pursues a Bachelor of Music degree with Professor Tabea Zimmermann at the Hochschule für Musik ‘Hanns Eisler’. He plays on an instrument made by Fréderic Chaudière in 2013.
Adam Newman began his musical studies aged 7, learning a variety of instruments including violin and piano before focusing on the viola aged fourteen. He proceeded to study at the Junior Royal Northern College of Music with Louise Lansdown. Newman graduated with first class honours from the Royal Academy of Music where he studied with Matthew Souter, Philip Dukes and Hu Kun. He then continued his studies in the class of Tatjana Masurenko at the Hochshule für Musik in Leipzig and in the Guildhall School of Music and Drama with Louise Hopkins. He is currently studying in Basel with Rainer Schmidt of the Hagen Quartett.
Newman has attended Verbier Festival, IMS Prussia Cove, Thy Chamber Music Festival, Tibor Varga Masterclasses and the London Masterclasses where he has studied with renowned musicians such as Tabea Zimmerman, Bruno Giurana, Ana Chumachenco, Gábor Takács- Nagy, Thomas Riebl, Nobuko Imai, Kim Kashkashian, Lawrence Power and Alfred Brendel.
He has had considerable success in both competitions and recitals. They included a Sir John Barbirolli Foundation Award towards the purchase of a new bow and the Duchess of Cornwall / English Chamber Music Award. He was also a finalist at the Windsor International String Competition where he was awarded the Bishops Instruments and Bows Prize for the most deserving finalist.
Newman has worked with the English Chamber Orchestra, Aurora Orchestra, Camerata Variabile Basel, Cappa Ensemble, London Conchord Ensemble, Razumovsky Ensemble, Aronowitz Ensemble, Nash Ensemble, and with such musicians as Patricia Rozario, Nicolas Daniel, Jorg Widmann and Valentin Erben.
Recipient of the 2010 Avery Fisher Career Grant, and First Prize Winner of the Walter E. Naumburg Viola Competition, David Aaron Carpenter has emerged as one of the world’s leading young artists. He has been acclaimed by Die Welt as “A New Star at the Forefront of Violists”; by The Philadelphia Inquirer as “an overnight-star violist”; and by The Strad Magazine as a violist whose “soulful sound, committed playing and dazzling technique leaves little to desire.” Since making his debut of the Walton Viola Concerto in 2005 with the Philadelphia Orchestra under Christoph Eschenbach, David has performed with leading musicians and orchestras in the United States and Europe. This past November, he made his debut in Germany with the Dresden Staatskapelle performing the Schnittke Viola Concerto. In 2008, he was Maxim Vengerov’s last-minute replacement for performances of Benjamin Yusupov’s Viola, Tango, Rock Concerto with the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra in Switzerland. He has performed in the United States at Carnegie Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, Chicago’s Krannert Center, and San Francisco’s Herbst Theatre, among other venues. In September, David released his first recording on the Ondine label of the Elgar Cello Concerto (arr. Lionel Tertis/Carpenter) and the Schnittke Viola Concerto with the Philharmonia Orchestra under Maestro Christoph Eschenbach. The disc received international acclaim and received numerous awards such as the Editor’s Choice Award by Gramophone Magazine and Disc of the Month by The New Yorker. As a chamber musician, David has collaborated with renowned artists Emanuel Ax, Sarah Chang, Sol Gabetta, Leonidas Kavakos, Julian Rachlin, Dmitry Sitkovetsky, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, and Yuja Wang and performs regularly at the Schleswig-Holstein and Verbier Music Festivals.
David was born in New York in 1986 into a family of musical siblings. He began his musical studies on the violin at age six with Nicole DiCecco and later on the viola at the age of 11. He pursued both instruments at the pre-college divisions of the Juilliard and Manhattan Schools of Music in New York under the tutelage of Toby Appel, Lewis Kaplan, Isaac Malkin, and Christina Khimm. He continued his studies with world-renowned viola pedagogues Yuri Bashmet, Roberto Diaz, Nobuko Imai, Robert Mann, Pinchas Zukerman. In 2005, David was the First Prize winner of the Greenfield Young Artists Competition and in 2006 he won the highly coveted First Prize at the Walter E. Naumburg Viola Competition. David was presented with the Presidential Gold Medal at a performance in Washington’s Kennedy Center subsequent to his winning the first ever Gold Award from the National Foundation for the Advancement of the Arts (NFAA). In June 2007, he became the first American protégé for the Rolex Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative with mentor Pinchas Zukerman. In addition to his musical accomplishments, David received his A.B. degree in Political Science and International Relations from Princeton University in 2008.
American violist Blythe Teh Engstroem studied violin with Nelli Shkolnikova and viola with Atar Arad at Indiana University Bloomington. She subsequently studied with Andrés Cárdenes in Pittsburgh. A passionate chamber musician, she has collaborated with Menahem Pressler, Yuja Wang, Lisa Batiashvili, Joshua Bell, Renaud Capuçon, Leonidas Kavakos, Pinchas Zukerman, Lawrence Power, Nobuko Imai, Gautier Capuçon and the Quatuor Ébène. She was a member of the Quatuor Terpsycordes (Switzerland). Blythe has performed at numerous festivals in Europe and the Far East and is a regular soloist at the Verbier Festival in Switzerland. She is a founding member of the Verbier Festival Chamber Orchestra which, under Gábor Takács-Nagy, tours regularly with artists including Martha Argerich, Joshua Bell and Maxim Vengerov. She has been the Chamber Orchestra’s concertmaster and currently leads the viola section. Blythe plays on a beautiful Maggini viola, on generous loan from a private benefactor.
Grammy nominated Ukrainian-British violist and conductor Maxim Rysanov has established himself as one of the worldʼs most vibrant and charismatic musicians. As a violist, he is principally known as a frequent guest of the crème of the international music scene, such as BBC Last Night of the Proms and the festivals of Edinburgh, Salzburg and Verbier.
Among his concerto highlights are the Mariinsky Orchestra (Valery Gergiev), Russian National Orchestra (Mikhail Pletnev), BBC Symphony Orchestra (Jiří Bělohlávek), Residentie Orkest the Hague (Neeme Jarvi), Svetlanov State Symphony Orchestra (Vladimir Jurovsky), Seattle Symphony (Andrey Boreyko), Orquesta Sinfónica de Castilla y León (Vasily Petrenko), Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin (Tugan Sokhiev), Moscow Philharmonic (Yuri Simonov), Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra (Vassily Sinaisky), Gürzenich Orchestra Cologne (Sir Mark Elder), Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra (Philippe Herreweghe), NDR Philharmonic Orchestra (Eivind Gullberg Jensen), Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra (Juraj Valcuha and again with Michał Nesterowicz), Adelaide Symphony Orchestra (Arvo Volmer), Danish National Symphony Orchestra (Michael Schoenwandt), Shanghai Symphony (Long Yu), European Union Youth Orchestra (Matthias Bamert), Czech Filharmonic (John Axelrod), Scottish Chamber Orchestra (Olari Elts), Spanish National Orchestra (Josep Caballe Domenech) and Beethovenorchester Bonn (Dirk Kaftan).
Maxim enjoys a busy career as a conductor parallel to playing the viola. Often he combines conducting and directing a concerto from viola. Maxim studied conducting with Alan Hazeldine at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and has taken part in several masterclasses with Gennady Rozhdestvensky and Jorma Panula. Here are some of the orchestras he conducted: Svetlanov State Symphony Orchestra, La Verdi Orchestra Milan, Basel Symphony Orchestra, Russian National Orchestra, Tatarstan State Symphony Orchestra, Spanish Radio Orchestra (RTVE), Orquesta Sinfónica de Castilla y León, Dala Sinfonietta, Danubia Symphony Budapest, London Mozart Players, Southbank Sinfonia, Riga Sinfonietta, Lithuanian Chamber Orchestra, I Musici de Montreal, Detmold Chamber Orchestra, Musica Viva (Moscow), Voronezh Youth Orchestra, Kiev Soloists, Częstochowa Philharmonic Orchestra, Chamber Orchestra Chaarts, Budapest Festival Academy Orchestra, Classic FM Orchestra (Bulgaria), Georgian National Symphony Orchestra, Plovdiv Philharmonic, Sofia Opera Orchestra and Chorus, Sofia Philharmonic, Pfortseim Theatre Orchestra, Badische Philharmonie, Vivaldi Orchestra Morbegno.
Maxim is a keen chamber musician. His chamber partners include Maxim Vengerov, Janine Jansen, Mischa Maisky, Gidon Kremer, Nicola Benedetti, Vadim Repin, Augustin Dumay, Viktoria Mullova, Alexander Sitkovetsky, Sol Gabetta, Leif Ove Andsnes, Denis Matsuev, Alessio Bax, Michael Collins, Martin Frost, Alice Coote, Freddy Kempf, Yeoelom Son among others.
His enthusiasm for new music generates many exciting collaborations which extend the viola repertoire. This includes world premieres by Dobrinka Tabakova, Pēteris Vasks, Richard Dubugnon, Mate Balogh and Elena Langer. Other composers with whom Maxim has developed a close working relationship include Benjamin Yusupov, Leonid Desyatnikov, Giya Kancheli and most recently Gabriel Prokofiev. Gabriel is planning to write a symphony-concerto for Maxim, where the performer will have to combine skills of both soloist and conductor.
Maxim’s recordings have gained numerous award nominations including Gramophone Editor’s Choice, ECHO, ICMA. Maxim featured as both soloist and conductor on the debut disc of composer Dobrinka Tabakova (ECM) in 2013 – a disc that reached number 2 in the UK classical charts and was shortlisted for a Grammy Award. His last album “in Schubert’s company” was selected as Gramophone Critic’s Choice of the Year. New CD is planned for a spring 2020 release on BIS. Sinfonietta Riga under Maxim’s direction are performing music by Peteris Vasks. It will include the premier recording of the Viola Concerto written and dedicated to Maxim, coupled with the Symphony no 1.
Maxim is a recipient of various awards, including the Gramophone Young Artist of the Year Award and the BBC Radio 3 New Generation Award. He is also a prize-winner at the Geneva, Lionel Tertis and Valentino Bucchi competitions.
Maxim studied viola with Maria Sitkovskaya in Moscow and John Glickman at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama London.
He is delighted to play a 1780 Giuseppe Guadagnini Viola known as ‘II Soldato’, on private loan that was kindly arranged by Premiere Performances of Hong Kong.
In the 21/22 season, Antoine Tamestit was able to showcase the breadth of his talents in residencies with the London Symphony Orchestra (Artist Portrait), Staatskapelle Dresden (Capell-Virtuos) and the Cologne Philharmonie (Porträtkünstler). In 22/23, he will be Artist-in-Residence at the Prague Spring Festival.
In recent seasons, Antoine has performed with orchestras including the Vienna Philharmonic, Boston Symphony, Bayerische Rundfunk, Orchestre de Paris, Czech Philharmonic, Orchestre National de France, Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Mahler Chamber Orchestra or the Akademie Für Alte Musik Berlin among many others. He performs regularly with major conductors including Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Alan Gilbert, Daniel Harding, Paavo Järvi, Klaus Mäkelä, Yannick Nezet-Seguin, Sir Antonio Pappano, Kirill Petrenko, Sir Simon Rattle, Francois-Xavier Roth, and Christian Thielemann.
Antoine Tamestit was a founding member of Trio Zimmermann with Frank Peter Zimmermann and Christian Poltera. Together they have recorded a number of acclaimed CDs for BIS Records, including Bach’s Goldberg Variations in their own arrangement, and have played in Europe’s most famous concert halls and series. Other chamber music partners include Emmanuel Ax, Isabelle Faust, Martin Fröst, Leonidas Kavakos, Nikolai Lugansky, Yo-Yo Ma, Emmanuel Pahud, Francesco Piemontesi, Cédric Tiberghien, Yuja Wang, Jörg Widmann, Shai Wosner and the Ébène Quartet.
Among the most important world premieres by Antoine Tamestit are Jörg Widmann’s Viola Concerto, Thierry Escaich’s La Nuit des Chants, Bruno Mantovani’s Concerto for Two Violas with Tabea Zimmermann, as well as Gérard Tamestit’s Sakura and Olga Neuwirth’s Remnants of Songs and Weariness Heals Wounds.
Together with Nobuko Imai, Antoine Tamestit continues to be the co-artistic director of the Viola Space Festival in Japan for 10 years, focusing on the development of viola repertoire and a wide range of education programmes.
Antoine records regularly with Harmonia Mundi as he continues to expand his vibrant scope of discography. Of the many of his acclaimed albums, Round Midnight with Quatuor Ebène was recently crowned with Chamber Award 2022 by the coveted Gramophone Award. His recent releases include Johannes Brahms’s Sonatas for Viola and Piano with Cédric Tiberghien and a Telemann album with the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin. His other most notable release was the Widmann Concerto, recorded with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and Daniel Harding in February 2018. The recording was selected as Editor’s Choice in BBC Music Magazine and also won the Premier Award at the BBC Music Magazine Awards in 2019.
Born in Paris, Tamestit studied with Jean Sulem, Jesse Levine, and with Tabea Zimmermann. He was the recipient of several prizes including first prize at the William Primrose Competition in 2001, and the ARD International Music Competition in 2004 as well as being awarded the Credit Suisse Young Artist Award in 2008. In November 2022 he will receive the Paul-Hindemith-Preis of the City of Hanau.
Antoine Tamestit plays on the very first viola made by Antonio Stradivarius in 1672, generously loaned by the Habisreutinger Foundation.
Isabel Charisius is one of the finest violists and chamber musicians of her generation. As a member of the legendary Alban Berg Quartet, in addition to solo performances and engagements as violist with various leading orchestras, Isabel Charisius has appeared regularly at the most prestigious venues in Europe, the Americas and Asia. Isabel Charisius is regularly invited to perform on both the viola and the violin, with distinguished ensembles and great soloists at international festivals and venues.
Alongside her intense concert activity, Isabel Charisius has for many years been dedicated to training new generations of musicians. She is an internationally recognised teacher of viola and chamber music. Her prolific teaching activity includes a professorship at the Musikhochschule Köln (2005-2012), the Musikhochschule Lucerne (since 2006) as well as a wide range of masterclasses at some of the most prestigious academies and institutions (including Britten Pears School/ Aldeburgh, Encuentro de Musica y Academia/Santander, the Dutch String Quartet Academy/ Amsterdam, Guildhall School of Music and Drama/London, the University of Arts/Berlin).
Isabel Charisius students can regularly be found among the winners of international competitions. Many of them are also members of the world’s finest ensembles and orchestras. The ensembles trained by Isabel Charisiusinclude among others the string quartets Heath, Signum, Schuman, Navarra, Amaryllis and Belenus as well as the piano trios Atos and Morgenstern.
Isabel Charisius plays the extraordinary “ABQ”-viola by Laurentius Storioni (1780), a viola by Peter Greiner (1999) and a special violin by Joannes Udalricus Eberle (1753).