Rapauke – It flies and crawls

Richard Polle was born into a family of musicians. At the age of six, he began his first violin lessons with his mother. At 12, Richard started his studies as a junior student at the Hochschule für Musik Franz Liszt Weimar with Jost Witter and continued his education two years later at the Musikgymnasium Schloss Belvedere Weimar. He completed his bachelor’s degree with honors under Josef Rissin at the Hochschule für Musik Karlsruhe and earned his master’s degree with Antje Weithaas at the Hochschule für Musik “Hanns Eisler” Berlin.

He won numerous national and international competitions, including first prizes and special prizes in solo and duo categories at the “Jugend musiziert” national competition, the international violin competition “Postacchini” in Fermo (Italy), the “Villa de Llanes” competition in Llanes (Spain), as well as awards at the international violin competition “Kocian” in Ústí nad Orlicí (Czech Republic), the international Lake Constance Violin Competition, and the competition of the Kulturfonds Baden e.V.

He has performed with the Kammerorchester der Rheinischen Philharmonie Koblenz, the Thüringen Philharmonie Gotha-Suhl, the Philharmonisches Orchester Erfurt, the Philharmonie der Stadt Kirow (Russia), the Junge Sinfonieorchester Berlin, the Südwestdeutsches Kammerorchester Pforzheim, and the Kurpfälzisches Kammerorchester Mannheim. He has also participated in several masterclasses, including those with Thomas Christian, Olga Parkhomenko, Roman Nodel, Ana Chumachenko, Boris Garlitsky, and Jörg Widmann.

Richard Polle has been a scholarship recipient from the Thüringen Ministry of Culture, the Sparkassenstiftung Erfurt, the Friends of the Hochschule für Musik Karlsruhe, the Musikinstrumentenfonds of the Deutsche Stiftung Musikleben, and received the Gerd Bucerius Scholarship from the ZEIT Foundation in the Deutsche Stiftung Musikleben.

From 2014 to 2016, he was a scholarship holder at the Orchestral Academy of the Radio Symphony Orchestra Berlin, and since 2016, he has been a permanent member of the first violins.

Peter Albrecht began playing the cello at the age of nine. After studying with Walther Nothas (Munich), Alexander Baillie (Bremen), and Michael Sanderling (Frankfurt/Berlin), he started his career as a cellist with the Radio Symphony Orchestra Berlin in 2002.

In parallel, he completed the Konzertexamen, which he finished in the summer of 2005. He also participated in numerous master and chamber music courses, including those with the Artemis Quartet, Henry W. Meyer, Frans Helmerson, Anner Bylsma, Ralph Kirshbaum, and Johannes Goritzki.

He performs together with Nadine Contini, Martin Eßmann, and Christiane Silber in the Contini Quartet, as well as in the cello quartet “Just Four Cellos” with Volkmar Weiche, Jörg Breuninger, and Christian Raudszus.

After successfully completing her vocal studies, Heike Link studied elementary music education at the Berlin University of the Arts and trained as a children’s choir director at the Bundesakademie Wolfenbüttel. From 1995 to 2020, she taught at various music schools in Berlin in the areas of early musical education, basic training and children’s choir. From August 2021 to August 2022, she trained as an educator and has been working in a small kindergarten in Berlin since August 2020. She is a freelance lecturer at the Landesmusikakademie and the UdK and works with the Rundfunksinfonieorchester Berlin.

Prof. Jule Greiner worked as an elementary music teacher at the Kreuzberg Music School before teaching at the University of the Arts in Berlin, where she subsequently held a professorship for elementary music education at Osnabrück University of Applied Sciences. She has also worked and continues to work as a lecturer in further and continuing education for teachers and educators as well as for musicians in kindergarten and concert programmes. She is co-author of various works on EMP and regularly writes articles on the subject in specialist journals.

As part of the Robert Bosch Stiftung’s ‘Art and Games’ funding project, she developed and designed the concert series ‘Rapauke macht Musik’ for children aged 3 to 6, which received the ‘JUNGE OHREN PREIS’ from the ‘netzwerk junge ohren’ for music education in 2017.

Isbael Stegner studied violin in Mannheim and Berlin and is a violinist with the Kammerakademie Potsdam. Inspired by music projects for her own children, she also completed a degree in music education at the Detmold University of Music and Performing Arts and has since worked passionately as a freelance music educator. In addition to the Rapauke series of the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin, she organises projects for the Kammerakademie and the Nikolaisaal in Potsdam and the Ensemble Aventure in Freiburg. She holds a teaching position at the Freiburg University of Music.
Communicating with the audience as equals, motivating fellow musicians, thinking creatively and reflecting the diversity of society: These are the principles that guide her in her work as a mediator.