Chamber Music Evening N° 2

Jörg Faßmann

Jörg Faßmann, born in Dessau in 1966, received his first violin lessons at the age of five. He made his debut as a soloist with an orchestra at the age of nine. He studied the violin from 1983 to 1989 at the Leipzig Academy of Music in the masterclass of Gustav Schmahl and Klaus Hertel and in Dresden with Reinhard Ulbricht. He has also won prizes at international violin competitions.

Jörg Faßmann has been a member of the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden since 1987, where he became deputy
1st concertmaster in 1989. In addition to his orchestral activities, he has been a member of the Dresdner StreichTrio since 1995, with whom he has performed extensively in Europe and overseas as well as numerous CD productions.

He has also worked with the pianist Gunther Anger for many years and has performed at numerous chamber music festivals and regularly at the Semperoper Dresden. He has been a guest soloist with various German orchestras and has performed with them in Italy and Asia, among other places.

Jörg Faßmann has also taught at the Dresden University of Music since 1991. In 2009, he also took on a masterclass at the Conservartorio Real Superior in Granada. In the same year, he was invited to give concerts and workshops at the University of Wisconsin.

Susanne Branny

Susanne Branny was born in Dresden and received her musical education at music school and later at the Special School of Music in Dresden. This is also where she studied violin at the Carl Maria von Weber Academy of Music.

In 1990, she was appointed concertmaster of the Schleswig-Holstein Festival Orchestra. In the same year, she began her engagement in the 1st violins of the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden. As a chamber music partner, she plays regularly with the Cappella Musica Dresden and frequently with the Dresdner Barocksolisten.

Susanne Branny is one of the founding members of the Dresdner Kapellsolisten. She has been their concertmaster since 2000 and as such has participated in relevant CD recordings of the chamber orchestra. She also appears frequently as a soloist at concerts in Germany and abroad (Semperoper Dresden, Philharmonie Köln, Musikhalle Hamburg, Rheingau Music Festival, Philharmonie Essen, Festspielhaus Bregenz, Munich, Tokyo, Yokohama, Osaka, Sapporo).

Anselm Telle

Originally from Heidelberg, Anselm Telle studied violin in Berlin at the Hochschule der Künste with Uwe-Martin Haiberg and at the Hanns Eisler Academy of Music with Ulf Wallin.

Before joining the Sächsische Staatskapelle, he was a member of the Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra and the Orchestra Academy of the Munich Philharmonic.

Anselm Telle has been a member of the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden since 1999. He is also a member of the Bayreuth Festival Orchestra.

Sae Shimabara

Sae Shimabara, born in Hyogo, Japan, initially studied in Tokyo at the Toho-Gakuen School of Music in the soloist class of Koichiro Harada. From 2000 to 2002, she continued her studies in Munich as a master class student of Ana Chumachenco at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater and with Urs Stiehler at the Richard Strauss Conservatory with the help of a scholarship from the Rohm Music Foundation. In addition, she attended masterclasses with Zakhar Bron, Pinchas Zuckermann, Herman Krebbers and Igor Oistrakh.

In addition to numerous solo performances with orchestras such as the Century Orchestra in Osaka, the Hyogo Symphony Orchestra and the Heemdstede Philharmonic Orchestra, Sae Shimabara is also active as a chamber musician.

She has made guest appearances at the Aspen Music Festival and the Casals Music Festival, among others. She also played as a ‘Rising Star’ at the ‘La Jolla Music Festival’ in the USA and as part of the ‘Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival’ with Carter Brey, principal cellist of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra.

Sae Shimabara has won the Osaka International Music Competition (Grand Prix) and has also been honoured several times at national level ─ with the music prize of the second largest Japanese daily newspaper ‘Asahi Shimbun’ and the ‘Sakai Tokitada’ prize.

Sae Shimabara has been a member of the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden since 2003.

Sonia Achkar

Hailed equally by audience and press for her »profound musicality, refined sensitivity and wide colour palette«, German born pianist Sonia Achkar has performed in concert halls worldwide such as Mannheimer Rosengarten, Stuttgarter Liederhalle, Gewandhaus zu Leipzig, Philharmonie Ludwigshafen, Beethovenhalle Bonn, Semperoper Dresden, National Center for Performing Arts Beijing (China), Shanghai City Theater and His Majesty’s Theater Perth (Australia). As a recitalist, soloist and accomplished chamber musician she has been invited to festivals throughout Europe, USA, Canada and Asia including Schleswig Holstein Musik Festival, Bachfest Leipzig, Kurt Weill Fest Dessau, Schwetzinger Festspiele, Carl Orff Festspiele (Germany), Thy Chamber Music Festival (Denmark), Toronto Summer Music Festival (Canada), Val Tidone Music Festival (Italy), Festival de Música de Cámara León (Spain) and Nancyphonies (France). The young Steinway Artist has been granted numerous awards at national and international competitions such as the Val Tidone International Music Competition and the Deutscher Musikwettbewerb. Her career has been supported by various foundations including Rotary International Foundation, Konrad-Adenauer Foundation, Richard-Wagner Foundation, PE-Trust, German Music Foundation, Culture Foundation Rhein-Neckar and Willy Robert Pitzer Trust. A dedicated chamber musician, Sonia Achkar is a very diverse and highly sought after partner. Together with Julius Bekesch (violin) and Jonathan Weigle (cello) she is a founding member of the State of the Art Piano Trio (SOTA Piano Trio), named after the SOTA Resonance Festival in Hyderabad (India) where they were invited in 2019.