Sun, Apr. 14, 2024, 11.00 am | Elbphilharmonie, Recital Hall
Alban Berg: Lyric Suite for string quartet
Anton Arensky: String Quartet No. 2 in A minor op. 35
Konradin Seitzer
Dorothee Fine
Sangyoon Lee
Olivia Jeremias
Violoncello: Saskia Hirschinger
Konradin Seitzer, born in Aachen in 1983, began playing the violin at the age of four and enrolled at the age of 14 as a junior student in the class of Atila Aydintan at the Hanover Academy of Music and Theatre. He then continued his studies with Antje Weithaas at the Hanns Eisler School of Music in Berlin, from which he graduated with distinction in January 2009. He has appeared around the world as a soloist with orchestras including the Konzerthaus Orchestra Berlin, the Brandenburg State Orchestra in Frankfurt and the State Orchestra Rheinische Philharmonie, appearing at venues such as the Konzerthaus Berlin, the Glocke in Bremen and the Seongnam Arts Center in South Korea. In addition to his work as a soloist, Konradin Seitzer is also dedicated to chamber music and has given concerts with artists such as Robert Levin, Thomas Brandis and Ulf Hoelscher. Konradin Seitzer was previously First Concertmaster of the orchestra of the Komische Oper Berlin; since 2012 he has held the same position at the Hamburg Philharmonic State Orchestra. In 2015 he received the Eduard Söring Prize of the Foundation for the Support of the Hamburg State Opera.
Dorothee Fine, born and raised in Berlin, began playing the violin at the age of six. After taking lessons while still in high school at the Berlin University of the Arts, where Koji Toyoda was her teacher, she studied with Klaus Maetzel at the Vienna University of Music and Performing Arts. After further studies with Uwe-Martin Haiberg at the Berlin University of the Arts, she graduated with a performance degree. She was a member of the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester and also participated in master classes with Christian Tetzlaff, Régis Pasquier and Antje Weithaas. Since 2008 Dorothee Fine has been a member of the Hamburg Philharmonic State Orchestra.
Sangyoon Lee was born in Seoul, South Korea, in 1989 and began playing viola at the age of nine. He has performed as a soloist with the Gangneung Philharmonic Orchestra and the Seoul National University String Ensemble in South Korea. He is also a first prize winner of the Hanyang and the Seoul Baroque Ensemble Competitions and won further international awards, for example at the Bordeaux String Quartet Competition in France, the Gianni Bergamo Classical Music Award in Switzerland and the International Max Rostal Competition in Berlin. Sangyoon Lee studied with Nimrod Guez at the Würzburg Academy of Music. He gained orchestral experience at the Hamburg Philharmonic State Orchestra when he held a limited contract there, and as an assistant section leader at the Hamburg Symphony Orchestra. Since 2019 he has been associate section leader of the viola section of the Hamburg Philharmonic State Orchestra.
Olivia Jeremias is one of the outstanding cellists of her generation. She began playing the instrument at the age of five. Taught by renowned cellists such as Peter Bruns, Colin Carr and Josephine Knight, she completed degrees at the Dresden Music Academy Carl Maria von Weber and at the Royal Academy of Music in London, both with honours. At the age of 20, she played the solo part in Dvořák’s Cello Concerto under the baton of Sir Colin Davis at Dresden’s Semper Opera, a performance also recorded for radio. She won international renown with a first prize at the Heran Competition in the Czech Republic and as a finalist in the Antonio Janigro Competition in Zagreb. In 2004 she received the Pierre Fournier Special Award. Olivia Jeremias appears regularly as a soloist with various orchestras, for example as the soloist in Tan Dun’s cello concerto “The Map” with the Essen Philharmonic. She has been invited to well-known festivals such as the Kilkenny Festival in Ireland, the Encuentro de Musica y Academia Festival in Santander, Spain, the Highgate Festival and Spitalfields Festival in London. In the summer 2004 she appeared at the Music at Menlo Festival in San Francisco, USA. In September 2005 Olivia Jeremias moved to Hamburg, where she holds the position of principal cellist of the Philharmonic State Orchestra.
Saskia Hirschinger was born in Halle an der Saale in 1995 and took cello lessons with Tamara Steger from the age of five. In 2014 she began studying with Wen-Sinn Yang at the Munich Academy of Music and Theatre. She received important musical impulses at master courses with Wolfgang Boettcher, Frans Helmerson, Wolfgang Emanuel Schmidt, Jens Peter Maintz and Troels Svane. During the 2018/19 season Saskia Hirschinger was a member of the Academy of the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra. She subsequently continued her master’s degree studies with Martin Ostertag at the Karlsruhe Music Academy. She also won several competitions and the award of the New Liszt Foundation in Weimar. Saskia Hirschinger was a fellow of “Live Music Now” in Munich and also won a “Deutschlandstipendium” scholarship. She gained orchestral experience as a cellist at the Stuttgart State Orchestra and as a substitute in the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra and the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra. In March 2020 Saskia Hirschinger became a member of the Hamburg Philharmonic State Orchestra.
It is considered the most demanding genre of instrumental music, the royal class of music par excellence: the string quartet. The special attraction for composer and performer lies in finding the balance between individualism and overall sound, when each instrument is equally challenged to soloistic flights of fancy and communal fourfoldness. The string quartet as a genre has succeeded in transforming and emancipating itself from bourgeois domestic music to an expression of the highest virtuosity.
One of the great word artists of the 20th century found probably the most apt description for Alban Berg's "Lyric Suite", describing it as a "latent opera" by none other than Theodor W. Adorno, faithful student of the composer. The presumable reason that led Berg to make the grand operatic gesture the expression of his chamber music, contrary to all expectations of genre, can be assumed to be private. For the "inner dedication" that the composer wrote was to a woman with whom he had a secret love affair: Hanna Fuchs-Robettin. The Russian late Romantic composer Anton Arensky also took unusual paths and was one of the few composers who broke the iron rule of string quartet instrumentation and doubled the cellos rather than the violins. That he chose to amplify the dark timbres had a sad reason: Pyotr I. Tchaikovsky died suddenly of cholera, and all of St. Petersburg was in shock. So, to commemorate his great role model, the still young Arensky wrote a musical homage in Moscow.
Venue: Elbphilharmonie, Recital Hall, Platz der Deutschen Einheit 4, 20457 Hamburg
Prices: € 28,00 / 20,00 / 14,00 / 10,00
