Centrepieces
Chamber concert
Three outstanding string quartets by Ben-Haim, Schulhoff & Beethoven open the 2021/2022 chamber music season
Programme
Paul Ben-Haim Streichquartett op. 21
Erwin Schulhoff String quartet No. 1
Ludwig van Beethoven Streichquartett a-Moll op. 132
Cast
Erez Ofer - Violin
Nadine Contini - Violin
Alejandro Regueira Caumel - Viola
Hans-Jakob Eschenburg - Violoncello
Centrepieces
The RSB’s 21/22 chamber music season begins in liberating fashion. For the first time, four concertmasters and string principals of the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin form an “ensemble of the first desks” (Hans-Jakob Eschenburg), which opens the evening with Paul Ben-Haim’s early string quartet from 1919. Paul Ben-Haim was born Paul Frankenburger in Munich in 1897 and emigrated to Palestine in 1933. This is followed by the String Quartet (1924), composed over three movements in a manner that is as folkloristically rousing as it is brash and modern, by Erwin Schulhoff, a German-Czech who was later sent to his death by the Nazis at Theresienstadt. At the end of its last (slow) movement, the solo viola intones an extinguishing heartbeat….
May the ethos set to music of Beethoven’s great A minor string quartet, with the Heiligen Dankgesang eines Genesenen an die Gottheit (holy song of thanksgiving) in the Adagio movement, finally and definitively bring people to their senses. It might even help them move on from the pandemic.
Mindful experience of music
We would like to invite you to dive into inner worlds for a few minutes right before the concert begins. Appropriate mindfulness exercises help relax the mind and body, sharpen the senses, and feel boundlessness.
Concert tickets for € 20 are normally available in the RSB visitor service; the mindfulness exercise is included in the price.
Here you will find information: Mindfulness exercises before chamber concerts
Artists
Erez Ofer
Violin
Erez Ofer - Violin
Born in Israel, violinist Erez Ofer has been the first concertmaster of the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin since 2002.
His musical career is flanked by several important successes in competitions: 1. Award at the ARD Competition in Munich, gold medal at the Zino Francescatti Competition in France, 1st prize at the Israeli Radio Competition, silver medal at the world-famous Queen Elisabeth Competition in Belgium and Paganini laureate at the University of Indiana and winner of the Tibor Varga Competition.
Despite his involvement with the RSB, Erez Ofer continues to be an active soloist and chamber musician. As a soloist, he was enlisted by the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Israel Philharmonic, the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Belgian National Orchestra, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo and the Jerusalem Symphony.
Between 1993 and 1998, Erez Ofer was concertmaster of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra under Lorin Maazel and the Philadelphia Orchestra under Wolfgang Sawallisch.
Erez Ofer plays a violin made by Domenico Montagnana in 1729.
Nadine Contini
Violin
Nadine Contini - Violin
Nadine Contini, principal second violin, has been a member of the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin since March 2005.
She was born in 1979 in Saarbrücken and received her first violin lessons at the age of 5 years with Ms Christa Schmitt-Rink. Later she studied under Ulrieke Dierick. In 1996 she was admitted to the Pflüger-Stiftung Freiburg and the Spohr-Akademie for the promotion of highly gifted young violinists, where she was trained by Wolfgang Marschner and Ariane Mathäus. In 2000, she began her studies at the Musikhochschule “Hanns Eisler” in Berlin with Antje Weithaas, where she graduated with the concert exam of 2008. She attended master classes with Antje Weithaas, Wolfgang Marschner, Christian Tetzlaff, Guy Braunstein, and Boris Pergamenchikov.
Nadine Contini has won awards in numerous competitions: In 1998, she was awarded with the first “Young Musicians” federal prize. In addition, she received a second prize at the International Max Reger Competition and a special prize for the best interpretation of a solo work by Max Reger. In 2004, she won the competition of Ibolyka-Gyarfas-Stiftung. She was awarded with prizes for cultural promotion by the Casino Gesellschaft Saarbrücken and the Saarländischen Rundfunk. In addition, she was the prize winner and scholarship holder of the Deutsche Stiftung Musikleben.
As a soloist, she has performed with the Landesjugendorchester of Saarland, the Cairo Chamber Orchestra, the Cairo Opera Orchestra, the Deutsche Spohr Philharmonie, the Symphonieorchester des Saarländischen Rundfunks as part of the concerts of young artists, the Max Bruch Philharmonie and the Brandenburger Symphoniker.
Nadine Contini plays a violin made by master violinmaker Stefan-Peter Greiner from Bonn and is involved as a mentor in the orchestra academy of the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin.
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