Choriner Musiksommer 2019

Vladimir Jurowski has been Chief Conductor and Artistic Director of the RundfunkSinfonieorchester Berlin (RSB) since 2017. In 2023/2024, his concerts, tours and recordings were the highlights of the ‘RSB100’ anniversary season. His current contract in Berlin runs until 2027,
while he has also been General Music Director of the Bavarian State Opera in Munich since 2021.

Vladimir Jurowski, one of the most sought-after conductors of our time, who is celebrated worldwide for his innovative musical interpretations and equally for his courageous artistic commitment, was born in Moscow in 1972 and completed the first part of his music studies at the Music College of the Moscow Conservatory. He moved to Germany with his family in 1990 and continued his studies at the music academies in Dresden and Berlin. In 1995, he made his debut at the Wexford Festival in Ireland with Rimsky-Korsakov’s ‘Mainacht’ and in 1996 at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden with ‘Nabucco’. He was then First Kapellmeister of the Komische Oper Berlin (1997-2001).

Vladimir Jurowski worked as Chief Conductor of the London Philharmonic Orchestra (LPO) for fifteen years until 2021 and has since been appointed Conductor Emeritus. In the UK, he was Music Director of Glyndebourne Festival Opera from 2001 to 2013, leading a wide range of highly acclaimed productions. His close connection to British musical life was recognised by King Charles III in spring 2024 when he appointed Vladimir Jurowski an Honorary Knight Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (KBE). In April 2024, Vladimir Jurowski returned to London as a guest conductor to complete the concert performance cycle of Wagner’s ‘Ring’ with ‘Götterdämmerung’ with the LPO at the Royal Festival Hall.

He was Artistic Director of the State Academic Symphony Orchestra ‘Yevgeny Svetlanov’ of the Russian Federation until 2021 and Principal Artist of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment in Great Britain, as well as Artistic Director of the International George Enescu Festival in Bucharest. He has also worked with the unitedberlin ensemble for many years. Vladimir Jurowski has suspended performances in Russia since February 2022. Ukrainian works are and will remain part of his repertoire, as will works by Russian composers.

Vladimir Jurowski has conducted concerts by the most important orchestras in Europe and North America, including the Berlin, Vienna and New York Philharmonics, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam, the Cleveland and Philadelphia Orchestras, the Boston and Chicago symphony orchestras, the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, the Staatskapelle Dresden and the Gewandhaus Orchestra Leipzig. He is a regular guest at the music festivals in London, Berlin, Dresden, Lucerne, SchleswigHolstein and Grafenegg. Although Vladimir Jurowski is invited as a guest conductor by top orchestras from all over the world, he now concentrates his activities on those geographical areas that he can easily reach with reasonable effort from an ecological point of view.

The joint CD recordings by Vladimir Jurowski and the RSB began in 2015 with Alfred Schnittke’s Symphony No. 3, followed by works by Britten, Hindemith, Strauss, Mahler and again Schnittke. Vladimir Jurowski has been honoured many times for his achievements, including numerous international record awards. In 2016, he received an honorary doctorate from the Royal Philharmonic Society from the hands of the current King Charles III. In 2020, Vladimir Jurowski’s work as Artistic Director of the George Enescu Festival was honoured by the Romanian President with the Order of Cultural Merit.

Soprano Chen Reiss performed leading parts at the Vienna State Opera, Bavarian State Opera, Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, Teatro alla Scala, Semperoper Dresden, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Hamburg State Opera, De Nederlandse Opera Amsterdam,Wiener Festwochen, Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Opera Company of Philadelphia and the Israeli Opera.

In 2016 She sang Morgana (Alcina) under Marc Minkowski at the Vienna State Opera, as well as Gretel and Sophie (Der Rosenkavalier). With the Vienna Philharmonic under the baton of Zubin Mehta, she sang a gala concert for Suntory Hall 30th Anniversary. In the same year Ms. Reiss also made her debut with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra under Daniele Gatti and sang Marzelline (Fidelio) with the Israel Philharmonic. In 2017 she will sing Zdenka (Arabella) and Marzelline (Fidelio) at the Vienna State Opera, Liu (Turandot) with the Israel Philharmonic, as well as  concerts with the Chicago Symphony, Munich Philharmonic and Lucerne symphony. She will perform at the London Proms, Lucerne Festival, SHMF and many more. Her debut at the Royal Opera House under Antonio Pappano is planned for 2018.

In December 2014 Chen Reiss was invited to sing for Pope Francis during the Christmas Mass, which was broadcast worldwide. Accompanied by the Berlin Philharmonic and Sir Simon Rattle, Ms. Reiss sang the soundtrack to the film “Perfume”. A frequent soloist at important concert venues worldwide, Ms. Reiss sang with distinguished conductors such as: Daniel Barenboim, Christoph Eschenbach, Daniele Gatti, Daniel Harding, Manfred Honeck, Marek Janowski, Paavo Järvi, James Levine, Zubin Mehta, Mark Minkowski, Jonathan Nott, Donald Runnicles, Jeffrey Tate, Christian Thielemann and Franz Welser-Möst.

She performed concerts at the Salzburg, Ludwigsburg, Rheingau and Lucerne Festivals, as well as in Carnegie Hall, Vienna’s Musikverein and Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels. Other concert appearances include: Vienna Philharmonic, Staatskapelle Berlin, Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, Radio Symphony Orchestra Berlin, Tonhalle Düsseldorf, Laeiszhalle Hamburg, Philharmonie Berlin, Concerto Köln, Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival, Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg, Orchestre de Paris, Orchestre National de France, Pittsburgh Symphony and Dallas Symphony, among others.

Her operatic repertoire includes: Gilda (Rigoletto), Adina (L’elisir d’amore), Amina (LA Sonnambula), Nannetta (Falstaff), Oscar (Un ballo in maschera), Marie (La fille du régiment), Sophie (Der Rosenkavalier), Zdenka (Arabella), Rosina (Il barbiere di Siviglia), Pamina (Die Zauberflöte), Ilia (Idomeneo), Servilia (La clemenza di Tito), Susanna (Le nozze di Figaro), Konstanze (Die Entfuehrung aus dem Serail), Zerlina (Don Giovanni), Euridice (Orfeo ed Euridice), Adele (Die Fledermaus), and the title role in Das Schlaue Füchslein.

Her solo album, LIAISONS, won the Diapason D’or in 2011. On her latest album “Le Rossignol et la Rose” Chen Reiss presents a romantic compilation of songs with distinguished pianist Charles Spencer.

Topi Lehtipuu enjoys a reputation as one of Finland’s most highly individual artists. In addition to a career as a tenor of international renown, Topi also enjoys a career as artistic consultant and curator. He was Director of the Helsinki Festival from 2015 to 2018, a wide-ranging and innovative multi-arts festival and a major event in Finland’s cultural year. He was also artistic director of Turku Music Festival from 2010 to 2015, as well as of Joroinen Music Days, a chamber music festival in eastern Finland.

As a singer, Topi has appeared in concert halls and opera houses throughout the world. An extremely versatile artist and a highly-skilled stage performer, he is renowned equally for repertoire ranging from early music, through Bach, Mozart and classical composers, to contemporary creations enjoying close relationships with the world’s leading conductors and directors.

Highlights in 2018-19 include the creation of the role of The Creature in Frankenstein, a new opera by Mark Gray, commissioned by La Monnaie/De Munt; Dionysus in Henze’s DieBassariden in Berlin’s Komische Oper, directed by Barrie Kosky and conducted by Vladimir Jurowski, as well as the creation of a multi-disciplinary dance and vocal project with the renowned Tero Saarinen Dance Company, featuring music by Monteverdi.

The baritone Dietrich Henschel is known as a regular guest at major opera houses, as a valued interpreter of song and oratorio, as the inventor and protagonist of a wide range of multimedia projects. His repertoire ranges from Monteverdi to the avant-garde.

Henschel began his international career with a co-production between Opéra de Lyon and Théâtre du Châtelet, Paris in the title role of Busoni’s opera Doktor Faust, for which he won a Grammy Award.

The singer’s leading roles include Rossini’s Figaro, Wolfram in Wagner’s Tannhäuser, Monteverdi’s Ulisse and Orfeo, Mozart’s Don Giovanni, Alban Berg’s Wozzeck and Dr. Schön in Lulu, Golaud in Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande and Nick Shadow in Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress. Contemporary opera also has an important part in Henschel’s repertoire; many great composers such as Pèter Éötvös, Detlev Glanert, Manfred Trojahn, Peter Ruzicka or Chaja Czernowin entrusted him with important roles in the premieres of their works.

In orchestral concerts, Henschel regularly works with conductors such as Sylvain Cambreling, Kent Nagano, Riccardo Chailly and Vladimir Jurowski. Recordings with John Eliot Gardiner, Philippe Herreweghe, Nikolaus Harnoncourt and Sir Colin Davis document his oratorio work. He has performed scenic versions of Schubert song cycles in La Monnaie, Theater an der Wien, Norske Opera Oslo and the Komische Oper Berlin, among others. In the project IRRSAL – triptych of forbidden love, conceived together with the director Clara Pons, orchestral songs by Hugo Wolf were combined with a feature film shot especially for their live performance; the great success of this project led to the follow-up project Wunderhorn, an international co-production involving 8 partner institutions, including La Monnaie, Bruxelles, BBC Symphony Orchestra London and De Doelen, Rotterdam.

The 2021/22 season includes the world premiere of Francesco Filidei’s The Red Death at the 100th anniversary of the Donaueschinger Musiktage, Bach’s St Matthew Passion with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra and Britten’s War Requiem with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. At the festival in Montepulciano, Henschel will perform Gaetano Donizetti’s opera Rita alongside the acclaimed soprano Patrizia Ciofi. In autumn 2022 he will make his role debut as Faninal in a production of Der Rosenkavalier at the Théâtre La Monnaie.

Vocalconsort Berlin is one of the most highly regarded and versatile vocal ensembles in Germany. Founded in 2003 Vocalconsort has no principal conductor, but is working instead on a project-by-project basis with various conductors, but also with long-term artistic partners such as Daniel Reuss, Folkert Uhde and Sasha
Waltz.

Vocalconsort Berlin is versatile in both instrumentation and repertoire, but always stylistically confident and of impressive homogeneity. It has enjoyed success in a wide variety of fields: from Monteverdi’s “L’Orfeo” under René Jacobs, Haydn’s “Four Seasons” under Christopher Moulds, Bernstein’s “A Quiet Place” under Kent Nagano and through to Peter Ruzicka’s “Inseln, Randlos” under the direction of the composer himself. Vocalconsort Berlin supported the opera choir on stage in Barrie Kosky’s production in Schönberg’s “Moses und Aron” under Vladimir Jurowski. The ensemble also plays an important role in many successful scenic productions by Sasha Waltz & Guests, such as “Dido & Aenes” by Purcell, “L’Orfeo” by Monteverdi, “Medea” by Dusapin and “Matsukaze” by Hosokawa.

CD recordings include Handel’s “Ode for Queen Anne” and “Dixit Dominus” with Andreas Scholl and the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, Handel’s “Athalia” with Nuria Real and the Kammerorchester Basel as well as Bach’s motets under Marcus Creed. Vocalconsort Berlin received the ECHO Klassik in 2013 for its recording of Gesualdo’s second book “Sacrae Cantiones” under James Wood.

In its own projects Vocalconsort Berlin likes to transcend the boundaries of classical genres and disciplines:
“Allegory of Desire” was created in collaboration with the Belgian ensemble Zefiro Torna and the Tunisian singer Ghalia Benali; “From Inside” combined works by Gesualdo and Giacinto Scelsi in a concert staged by Hans-Werner Kroesinger; “Libera Me” combines music by Lobo, Desprez and Gesualdo with contemporary
dance.

In the 2017/18 season, Vocalconsort Berlin made its debut with the Berliner Philharmoniker under Sir Simon Rattle in a semi-staged production of Janacek’s “Schlauen Füchslein”, which was directed by Peter Sellars. In recent years the collaboration with the Konzerthausorchester under the direction of Iván Fischer and the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin under the direction of Vladimir Jurowski has intensified. The Komische Oper Berlin has been a close partner within the last years. On occasion of the 2019 Salzburg Festival Vocalconsort Berlin participated in “Orphée aux Enfers” by Offenbach, a highly acclaimed production of Barrie Kosky with the Vienna Philharmonic under Enrique Mazzola. The close cooperation has continued under the new directorship of Philip Bröking (as e.g. “Orfeo ed Euridice” by Gluck, “Intolleranza 1960” by Nono, both in 2022). In the beginning of 2023, the ensemble worked together with Moritz von Oswald, recording the choir version for his project “Silencio”, an album with purely electronic pieces.

Vocalconsort Berlin maintains a regular presence in the music metropolises and at the major festivals in Europe and overseas. It has worked with conductors such as Marcus Creed, Jos van Immerseel, Ottavio Dantone, Christophe Rousset, Pablo Heras-Casado and Peter Ruzicka.

Ralf Sochaczewsky received conducting lessons under Christian Grube and Marc Piollet at the Berlin University of the Arts. Later he studied choir conducting under Jörg-Peter Weigle and orchestral conducting under Prof. Reuter at the Hochschule für Musik “Hanns Eisler”.

He directs the Berlin choir Cantus Domus, with which he won a 1st prize at the Berlin Choir Competition in 2017 and a 3rd prize at the 8th Choir Competition of the Deutscher Musikrat in Dortmund . From 1998 to 2012, he conducted the Ensemberlino Vocale choir and successfully participated in choir competitions (1st prize at Chorfest Bremen (Bremen Choir Festival) 2008).

He regularly works with choirs like the Berlin Vocalconsort, the Cappella Amsterdam, the RIAS Kammerchor, and the Berliner Rundfunkchor.

In 2016, he conducted the European premiere of the oratorio “Anthracite Fields” by Julia Wolfe, which won the Pulitzer Prize in 2015, with the DR Vocalensemble and Bang on a Can-All Stars.

Ralf Sochaczewsky has performed with orchestras such as the London Philharmonic Orchestra, the Konzerthausorchester Berlin, the National Radio Orchestra Bucharest, and the Chamber Orchestra of the Minsk Philharmonic. He conducted operas at the Bolshoi Theatre Moscow, the Komische Oper Berlin, the Opera National du Rhin, and the Lithuanian National Opera.

Ralf Sochaczewsky collaborated with various pop groups and artists such as Stargaze and André de Ridder, Bon Iver, Damien Rice, Lisa Hannigan, and Tocotronic. With Cantus Domus, he is a regular guest at festivals such as HaldernPop and KalternPop.

He teaches choral conducting at the Hochschule für Musik “Hanns Eisler”. For his great service to the Berlin choir scene, the Chorverband Berlin awarded him the Geschwister Mendelssohn Medal in 2017.