Symphony Concert N° 9

Riccardo Minasi

Chief Conductor of Mozarteumorchester Salzburg, »Artist in Residence« of the Ensemble Resonanz at the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg and regular guest of the Orchestra La Scintilla at the Opernhaus Zürich, Riccardo Minasi has recently received invitations as guest conductor from orchestras such as the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden, Concertgebouworkest, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Teatro Carlo Felice di Genova,  Netherlands Chamber Orchestra, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana, Orchestre National de Belgique.

In the recent years he conducted Tokyo Metropolitan Orchestra, Hessischer Rundfunk Sinfonieorchester, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Academy of Ancient Music, Konzerthausorchester Berlin, Philarmonia Zürich, Orchestre National de Lyon, Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne, London Chamber Orchestra, Zürcher Kammerorchester, Kammerorchester Basel, Philharmonische Staatsorchester Hamburg, Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, Orquestra Sinfónica Portuguesa, Stavanger Symfoniorkester, Portland Baroque Orchestra, Il Complesso Barocco, Orquesta Barroca de Sevilla, Kammerakademie Potsdam and Helsinki Baroque Orchestra with whom he was the associate music director from 2008 to 2011.

Most recent operatic engagements include Les Pêcheurs de perles at the Salzburg Festival, Don Giovanni, Entführung aus dem Serail, Orlando Paladino, Matrimonio Segreto, Il Pirata, Viaggio a Reims, Turco in Italia and the ballets by Christian Spuck on music by Schnittke, Schumann and Monteverdi at Zürich Opera, Iphigénie en Tauride, Alcina, Nozze di Figaro, Agrippina at the Hamburg Staatsoper, Carmen at the Opera in Lyon, Rinaldo at the Theater an der Wien, Rodelinda and Le Nozze di Figaro at the Dutch National Opera.

In collaboration with Maurizio Biondi he published the critical edition of Norma for Bärenreiter in 2016. Co-founder and director of the ensemble il Pomo d’oro from 2012 to 2015, he was professor at the conservatory Vincenzo Bellini of Palermo between 2004 and 2010. He has held seminars, master classes and historical performance practice lessons at the Juilliard School of Music of New York, Longy School of Music of Cambridge (USA), Sibelius Academy of Helsinki, Hochschule für Musik Hannover, Antwerp conservatory, Chinese culture university of Taipei (Taiwan), Zürich Opernhaus, Kùks residence (Czech Republic), Scuola di Musica di Fiesole, Sydney conservatory (Australia), at the European Union Baroque Orchestra (EUBO) and as historical advisor for the Montréal Symphony Orchestra (Canada).

Among the numerous prizes received, notably are the albums »Rosenkranz Sonaten« by Biber (finalist at the Midem Classical Award Cannes as album of the year 2009),»Stella di Napoli« with Joyce Di Donato (Diapason d’Or of the year 2015, BBC Music magazine Award, Grammophone Choice, Grammy Award nominee 2015), »Agrippina« with Ann Hallenberg (International Opera Award 2016), »Partenope» with Philippe Jaroussky and Karina Gauvin, »Catone in Utica«, »Giovincello« and »Haydn concertos« (Echo-Klassik Award 2016), »The Seven Last Words of Christ« by Haydn with Ensemble Resonanz (Diapason d’Or of the year 2018) and the C.P.E.Bach cello concertos with Jean- Guhien Queyras (Diapason d’Or of the year 2019).

Rudolf Buchbinder

Rudolf Buchbinder is one of the legendary artists of our time. His piano playing is an unparalleled fusion of the authority of a career spanning more than sixty years with spirit and spontaneity. 

His renditions of Ludwig van Beethoven's works are considered to be exemplary. He has performed the thirty-two piano sonatas sixty times in cycles all over the world and developed the story of their interpretation over decades. He was the first pianist to play all Beethoven sonatas at the Salzburg Festival during a festival summer.

In the 2019/20 season, for the first time in its 150-year history, the Musikverein Vienna was granting a single pianist, Rudolf Buchbinder, the honour of performing all five Beethoven piano concertos with five world class orchestras and conductors in a specially edited cycle. Buchbinder's partners in this unprecedented constellation were the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra under Andris Nelsons, the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra under Riccardo Muti and the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra and the Staatskapelle Dresden under their chief conductors Mariss Jansons, Valery Gergiev and Christian Thielemann.