Paul Lewis - Piano

Paul Lewis is one of the foremost interpreters of the Central European piano repertoire, his performances and recordings of Beethoven and Schubert receiving universal critical acclaim. He was awarded CBE for his services to music, and the sincerity and depth of his musical approach have won him fans around the world.

This global popularity is reflected in the world-class orchestras with whom he works, including the Berlin Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony, London Symphony, Philharmonia, Bavarian Radio Symphony, NHK Symphony, New York Philharmonic, LA Philharmonic, Royal Concertgebouw and Leipzig Gewandhaus orchestras. His close relationship with Boston Symphony Orchestra led to his selection as the 2020 Koussevitzky Artist at Tanglewood.

With a natural affinity for Beethoven, he took part in the BBC’s three-part documentary Being Beethoven and performed a concerto cycle at Tanglewood in summer 2022. He has performed the cycle all over the world, and was the first pianist to play the complete cycle in a single season at the BBC Proms in 2010.

Beyond many award-winning Beethoven recordings, his discography with Harmonia Mundi also demonstrates his characteristic depth of approach in Romantic repertoire such as Schumann, Mussorgsky, Brahms and Liszt.

In chamber music, Paul Lewis works closely with tenor Mark Padmore in lied recitals around the world – they have recorded three Schubert song cycles together. Between 2022 and 2024, Paul Lewis embarked on a new Schubert Piano Sonata Series where he will present the completed sonatas from the last 12 years of Schubert’s life at venues around the world. Lewis is co-Artistic Director of Midsummer Music, an annual chamber music festival held in Buckinghamshire, UK.

Awards: Royal Philharmonic Society Instrumentalist of the Year; two Edison awards; three Gramophone awards; Diapason d’Or de l’Annee; South Bank Show Classical Music Award; honorary degrees from Liverpool, Edge Hill and Southampton Universities; appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2016 Queen’s Birthday Honours.

www.paullewispiano.co.uk

Bjørg Lewis - Cello

Bjørg Lewis is one of Norway’s most highly esteemed cellists.  As a soloist, she played with the Oslo Philharmonic as well as many other orchestras throughout Norway, Sweden, Finland and the Baltics.

Bjørg is a founder member of the Vertavo String Quartet, an internationally-acclaimed ensemble, which has received numerous awards including Norway’s prestigious Grieg Prize. Vertavo launched their own chamber music festival, Vertavofestivalen in 2016.

A busy performance schedule takes Bjørg throughout Europe and North America. A frequent participant in many international chamber music festivals, Bjørg was also been regularly invited to join the Nash Ensemble for Wigmore Hall concerts and tours. She was Artistic Director of the Elverum Festival in Norway from 2001- 2015 and co-Artistic Director of Midsummer Music since its inception in 2009.

Since 2018, Bjørg has held the position of Associate Professor of Cello at the Norwegian Academy of Music in Oslo. In 2024 she curated athe Academy's first ever International Cello Festival. She is frequently invited to give masterclasses and be a jury member at many international chamber music competitions

Bjørg plays on a 1748 Gennaro Gagliano cello provided for her by the Dextra Musica Foundation, previously played by Martin Lovett of the Amadeus Quartet

www.vertavo.com

Tommaso Lonquich - Clarinet

Praised by reviewers for his "passion, sumptuous tone, magical finesse and dazzling virtuosity", Italian-born Tommaso Lonquichis solo clarinetist with Ensemble MidtVest in Denmark and an Artist of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in New York.

He has appeared on the world’s most prestigious stages, including Carnegie Hall, Wigmore Hall and Tokyo’s Suntory Hall collaborating with Pekka Kuusisto, Carolin Widmann, Nicolas Dautricourt, Maximilian Hornung, Yura Lee, Christoph Richter, Alexander Lonquich, Wu Qian and the Danish and Zaïde string quartets. 

He has collaborated with conductors including Zubin Mehta, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Fabio Luisi, and Leonard Slatkin and has appeared as a soloist with the RadioTelevision Orchestra of Slovenia and the Orchestra del Teatro Olimpico of Vicenza, among others.

Tommaso is Artistic Co-Director of KantorAtelier, a vibrant cultural space in Florence, and has given masterclasses at The Juilliard School, the Manhattan School of Music and the Royal Welsh College of Music, among others.

Mario Häring - Piano

Mario Häring was born in November 1989 in Hanover, Germany and grew up in Berlin. Descending from a Japanese-German family of musicians, he gained first experiences with the piano and violin at the young age of three years. After studying with Karl-Heinz Kämmerling and Lars Vogt, he finished his Master’s degree with the highest grade in 2017.

At the International Leeds Piano Competition in 2018 he was awarded the 2nd prize and the Yaltah Menuhin Award for the best chamber music performance.

After his orchestral debut with the Berlin Symphony Orchestra at the Berlin Philharmonic Hall in 2003, more concerts with orchestra followed, among others at the Philharmonic Hall in Constance, the Tokyo Metropolitan Theater, Tokyo Bunka Kaikan and the Berlin Philharmonic Hall for six more times.

He continues playing concerts at renowned halls such as the Konzerthaus Berlin, the Laeiszhalle in Hamburg and the Suntory Hall in Tokyo. He was also a guest at festivals such as the Schwetzinger Festival, the Schleswig-Holstein Musikfestival, the Kissinger Sommer and the festival “Spannungen” in Heimbach. In spring of 2017 he was the first “Intendant in residence” of the newly founded festival “:alpenarte” in Schwarzenberg, Austria.

Concert engagements led him to most European countries, Japan, China, Namibia and the USA.

On his new ICMA and PdSK nominated album “...les Préludes sont des Images” Mario Häring delivers atmospheric interpretations of works by Debussy.

Nika Gorič - Soprano

Born in Slovenia in 1990, Nika studied at the Ballet and Music School in Maribor, the University of Music and Performing Arts in Graz, and the Royal Academy of Music where she is completing her studies with Lillian Watson and Jonathan Papp on the Opera Course.   She was selected by Young Classical Artists Trust (YCAT) in 2016.

This summer Nika joined Salzburg Festival’s Young Singers Project, taking part in  a new production of The Fairy Queen and in masterclasses with Thomas Hampson and Ann Murray.  Over the last year she has performed in a production of Handel’s Messiah with Opera National de Bordeaux and sung the roles of Susanna (Marriage of FIgaro) and Fortuna and Pallade (L'incoronazione di Poppea) with RAO.

During the 2016/17 season Nika takes the roles Norina (Don Pasquale) with Slovene National Theatre and Eurydice (Offenbach’s Orfeo and Eurydice) with RAO.  She gives recitals at the Oxford Lieder Festival and at Wigmore Hall.

Previous concert appearances include the Klavier Festival Ruhr with Graham Johnson, Kioi Hall (Tokyo) and the Festival Maribor with Richard Tognetti.

Esther Hoppe - Violin

The Swiss violinist Esther Hoppe is amongst the most compelling artists of her generation as a soloist, chamber musician and pedagogue. 

After studying in Basel, Philadelphia (Curtis Institute of Music), London and Zürich, she went on to win 1st Prize at the 8th International Mozart Competition Salzburg. Soon after she founded the Tecchler Trio with whom she won the ARD-competition in Munich in 2007.

She has an exciting concert calendar and performs as a soloist with Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, Münchener Kammerorchester, Orchestre Les Siècles Paris, Kammerorchester Basel, Zürcher Kammerorchester amongst others.

Esther Hoppe is a regular guest at the world’s most prestigious festivals and her chamber music partners include Ronald Brautigam, Christian Poltéra, Francesco Piemontesi, Clemens and Veronika Hagen and Vilde Frang.

Since 2013 Esther Hoppe is violin professor at the University Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria.

She has recorded two highly acclaimed CDs for Claves Records with Alasdair Beatson: Mozart and Stravinsky in 2014 and Mozart and Poulenc in 2017. 

Esther Hoppe plays on a 1690 Gioffredo Cappa violin. She lives with her family in Zürich.

Juan-Miguel Hernandez - Viola

Performances as soloist and chamber musician have seen Juan-Miguel Hernandez on some of the world’s leading halls, including Carnegie Hall, Concertgebouw (Amsterdam), Disney Hall (Los Angeles), Salzburg Mozarteum, King’s Place (London), Hamburg Elbphilharmonie and The White House.  

As a soloist Juan-Miguel has made appearances with orchestras, including the Rochester Philharmonic, San Fransisco Chamber Orchestra, the Chicago Sinfonietta, iPalpiti Orchestra, as well as the Colorado and Atlanta Symphonies. As a chamber musician he has collaborated with distinguished artists such as Lynn Harrell, Ralph Kirshbaum, Kim Kashkashian, Gérard Caussé and Itzhak Perlman. 

Chamber music being at the forefront of his career, Juan-Miguel was a founder and member of the Harlem Quartet from 2006 to 2012 after which he joined the legendary Fine Arts Quartet from 2013 until 2018. He is a also founder and member of the "Trio Virado" (Flute, Viola, Guitar) as well as the "Boreal Trio” (Clarinet, Viola, Piano), both specializing in the creation of new repertoire.

Juan-Miguel Hernandez was born in Montreal, Canada and began his musical studies at the age of seven. Among his teachers were Jean MacRae, Paul Coletti at the Colburn Conservatory and Kim Kashkashian at the New England Conservatory. He also worked with Dimitri Murrath, Paul Neubauer, Karen Tuttle, Steven Dann, James Dunham, Barbara Westphal and Pinchas Zukerman.

In 2016 Juan-Miguel was appointed as a professor at the Royal Academy of Music (London). He was invited to serve on the Jury of the 2017 Johannes Brahms International Competition/Austria and the 2018 Sphinx Competition/USA. He plays on a 2008 Miralles viola from Altadena/CA.

Christian Poltéra - Cello

As one of the most impressive cellists of his generation, Poltéra's performance focuses on music alone: without many gestures, he reveals the essence of a work. His unique timbre is characteristic of his interpretations, masterfully adapted to epochs and styles.

Already at a very young age, the Swiss Christian Poltéra chose the cello. He began his studies with Nancy Chumachenco and then continued with Boris Pergamenschikov and Heinrich Schiff in Salzburg and

Vienna. In 2004, he was awarded the Borletti-Buitoni Prize and named "BBC New Generation Artist" and as "Rising Star" two years later, he was able to present himself to audiences in the big European concert halls.

Invitations from renowned orchestras have led him around the world. He has appeared with the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, Los Angeles and Oslo Philharmonic Orchestras, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Bamberger Symphoniker, Orchestre de Paris, Deutsches Symphonie- Orchester Berlin, Münchner Philharmoniker, Santa Cecilia Orchestra Rome, Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen and the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich under conductors such as Riccardo Chailly, Christoph von Dohnányi, Bernard Haitink, John Eliot Gardiner, Paavo Järvi and Andris Nelsons.

He is also frequently heard performing at major international festivals in Salzburg, Lucerne, Edinburgh, Berlin, Vienna, Schleswig-Holstein and London.

Christian Poltéra's much acclaimed recordings reflect his versatile and extensive repertoire. Among the award-winning CD recordings include the cello concertos by Dvorak, Walton, Ligeti, Barber, Dutilleux, Lutoslawski, Honegger, Hindemith and Martin, as well as sonatas by Mendelssohn (including BBC Music Award, Gramophone Choice, Diapson D'Or de l'année), Fauré and Saint-Saens. At last his album with the Shostakovich and Martinů second celloconcertos, with the Deutsche Symphonie-Orchester Berlin and Gilbert Varga was released in 2017.

Since 2013, Christian Poltéra is Artistic Director of the Chamber Music Days in the mountain church Büsingen. He is also a lecturer at the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and regularly gives masterclasses.

He plays an Antonio Casini cello built in 1675 and the legendary Mara cello of Antonio Stradivari from 1711.

Vertavo - String Quartet

Øyvor Volle violin

Annabelle Meare violin

Berit Cardas viola

Bjørg Lewis cello

Vertavo Quartet is internationally recognised as one of the most masterful string quartets playing today. Since their formation in Norway in 1984, their dynamic and deeply thoughtful performances have captivated audiences world-wide. 

They have collaborated with many of the world’s finest musicians including an acclaimed quintet tour with Paul Lewis and opened the London Proms Chamber Music season.

The quartet’s discography includes Schumann, Brahms, Grieg, Debussy, Bartok, Nielsen, Asheim and late Beethoven, as well as the Mozart clarinet quintet with Martin Fröst. Their Debussy and Grieg recording received the Diapason d’Or. 

Vertavo Quartet has been honoured with the Grieg-Prize - Norway’s highest recognition of musical excellence and achievement. 

Vertavo were Artistic Directors of the Elverum Music Festival in Norway for many years and now run their own chamber music festival - Vertavofestivalen.

Cellissimo@Oslo - Cello Ensemble

Cellissimo@Oslo is a recently formed cello ensemble. Bjørg Lewis, Associate Professor of Cello at the Norwegian Academy of Music started this up in 2018 with the intention of exploring and promoting repertoire for the richly-voiced large cello ensemble format. 

Cellissimo@Oslo's trip to Midsummer Music is their debut performance outside of Oslo.