Hungarian-American violinist Abigel Kralik is quickly gaining attention as “a shooting star in the truest sense of the word” (Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk Kultur). Abigel began playing the violin in Dublin Ireland, and continued her musical journey in Budapest, Hungary. After briefly studying in Paris she now calls New York her home. As a passionate soloist and chamber musician, Abigel has appeared with the Savaria and MAV Symphony Orchestras as well as the Szentendre and Anima Musicae Chamber Orchestras and frequently performs with Jupiter Symphony Chamber Players at Lincoln Center.

Abigel has won top prizes at the New York International Artists Association, Vienna International Music Competition, Rising Stars (Berlin) Grand Prix, Talents for Europe International Competition, and Koncz Janos competition. She also has appeared as a featured artist at the Verbier, Clasclas, Budapest, Krzyzowa and Moritzburg and Prussia Cove Festivals, as well as the Perlman Music Program and Festival Mozaic. Kralik has collaborated with artists such as Itzhak Perlman, Guy Braunstein, Vilde Frang, Viviane Hagner, Hsin-Yun Huang, Maxim Rysanov, Jan Vogler, and Gary Hoffman.

Abigel studied with Kristóf Baráti in Budapest and earned her Bachelor’s and Master’s degree from The Juilliard School under the tutelage of Itzhak Perlman and Laurie Smukler. She was awarded the Kovner Fellowship for all six years.

For the 20–21 Season Abigel has many exciting projects on the horizon including a release of a series of recordings encompassing all of the Beethoven quartets, sponsored by Project: Music Heals us. She will perform Sibelius concerto with the Mexico Philharmonic under the baton of Scott Yoo and will give a world premier of a piece for solo violin by Horacio Fernández. She is the Artist in Residence at Festival Mozaic in California, which includes curating and performing solo and chamber music recitals this season. Abigel is the founder and musical director of a new year-round concert series in New York in partnership with the Hungarian consulate that brings together musicians and audiences in intimate settings to explore the music of Eastern Europe.

Belgian violinist Jiska Lambrecht (*1997) is both active as a soloist and as a passionate chamber musician. She aims to bring captivating and stylistically varied repertoire, from baroque to contemporary music, to her audiences.

Jiska is a prizewinner of various competitions. In 2022 she won second prize at the Kiwanis Music Competition with the Turicum Quartet. Last March, the quartet made their debut in Tonhalle Zürich.

Since last year, Jiska is a member of CHAARTS Chamber Artists. She is also part of the string orchestra Bryggen Bruges Strings.

Jiska was invited to GAIA Music Festival, Aurora Old Ox Music Festival, Arte Amanti International Chamber Music Festival, Boswiler Sommer, Arosa Klassik Festival, Kaposfest and Festival Academy Budapest, where she performed with José Gallardo, Natalia Lomeiko, Maxim Rysanov and the legendary Shlomo Mintz. At the Mizmorim Festival in Basel she played alongside the Gringolts Quartet. 

Jiska performed in most European countries, the UK and Russia. She worked with composers such as Jörg Widmann, Michael Jarrell, Yinam Leef and Mathias Coppens.

Her teachers include Natasha Boyarsky, Jolente De Maeyer and Barnabás Kelemen. Currently, Jiska is doing the soloist diploma with Ilya Gringolts at the Zürcher Hochschule der Künste. She is also studying baroque violin with Monika Baer. She took part in masterclasses with Svetlana Makarova, Erik Schumann, Kristóf Baráti, Lutsia Ibragimova and Eszter Perényi amongst others. 

In 2022–2023 Jiska is artist in residence for SWUK Flanders.

“A daring and exciting performer who ventures courageously into unknown territory with relish.” – The Irish Times

Gwendolyn Masin is one of today’s significant concert violinists and an innovator in classical music. She enjoys a flourishing career that takes her all over Europe and the United States, as well as Asia, Russia, South Africa, and the Middle East, performing as a soloist, and in collaboration with musicians, artists, and orchestras.

Gwendolyn is descendant of a lineage of classically-trained musicians from Central and Eastern Europe. She holds degrees with highest honours from the Royal Schools of Music in London, the Hochschule der Künste in Berne, the Musikhochschule in Lübeck, and a PhD from Trinity College, Ireland. Her doctoral thesis (2012) examines the similarities and differences within 20th-century violin. Her teachers include her parents, Herman Krebbers, Igor Ozim, Ana Chumachenco, Zakhar Bron and Shmuel Ashkenasi.

Gwendolyn approaches education, research, writing, and public speaking with zeal. In 2009, the award-winning, Michaela’s Music House, The Magic of the Violin, was published. The method includes her studies and compositions and is available in English and German as part of the ESTA Edition collection available via Müller & Schade. From 2013 to 2021, Gwendolyn was professor and researcher of violin studies at the Haute École de Musique de Genève, Switzerland.

As a commissioner for contemporary music, Gwendolyn has premiered works by, amongst others, Raymond Deane, Thorsten Encke, Thomas Fortmann, Don Li, Urs Peter Schneider, Daniel Schnyder, Eric Sweeney, Dobrinka Tabakova, Martijn Voorvelt, and John Buckley, the latter of whom dedicated his first violin concerto to her.

One of her intentions is creating alternative means that bring more music to more people. Gwendolyn is very active as an artistic director and producer. Most prominent for her is her role as founding artistic director of GAIA, an annual festival held in Switzerland since 2009.

Gwendolyn is an Orchid Classics and a Naxos recording artist.

Peter is renowned for his pioneering approach to the interpretation of early and modern music. He performs regularly as a soloist in over 30 countries and has recorded more than 70 albums, ranging from solo pieces from the 17th century to works dedicated to him by composers such as George Rochberg, Judith Weir, Poul Ruders, David Matthews and Michael Finnissy. He was nominated for a Grammy for his cycle of Henze concertos. His work with museums has resulted in long-term projects with the National Gallery of Art, Washington DC, the Metropolitan Museum, New York City, the Victoria and Albert Museum, the British Museum, Galeria Rufino Tamayo in Mexico City and the exhibition "Only Connect" at the National Portrait Gallery, London, with him as curator. His "Tegner", commissioned by the Bergen International Festival – a close collaboration with the renowned abstract artist Jan Groth from Norway – premiered at the Kunsthalle in Bergen and from there toured through Denmark and the USA to Svalbard/Spitsbergen. Peter is the founder and leader of the highly acclaimed Kreutzer Quartet. He also serves as "Viotti Lecturer" at the Royal Academy of Music, of which he has been an elected Fellow since 2013.

Garth Knox was born in Ireland and spent his childhood in Scotland. Being the youngest of four children who all played string instruments, he was encouraged to take up the viola and quickly decided to make this his career. He studied with Frederic Riddle at the Royal College of Music in London where he won several prizes for viola and for chamber music. Thereafter he played with most of the leading groups in London in a mixture of all repertoires, from baroque to contemporary music.

In 1983 he was invited by Pierre Boulez to become a member of the Ensemble InterContemporain in Paris, which involved regular solo playing, including concertos directed by Pierre Boulez, and chamber music, touring widely and playing in international festivals.

In 1990 Garth Knox joined the Arditti String Quartet, which led him to play in all the major concert halls of the world, working closely with and giving first performances of pieces by most of today’s leading composers including Ligeti, Kurtag, Berio, Xenakis, Lachenmann, Cage, Feldman and Stockhausen (the famous“Helicopter Quartet”).

Since leaving the quartet In 1998, to concentrate on his solo career, he has given premieres by Ligeti, Schnittke, George Benjamin and many others, including pieces which were especially written for him by composers like Henze, Haas, Saariaho, James Dillon. He also collaborates regularly in theatre and dance projects, and has written and performed a one-man show for children.

He has recently become a pioneer of the viola d’amore, exploring its possibilities in new music, with and without electronics, and is in the process of creating a new repertoire for this instrument.

Garth Knox now lives in Paris, where he enjoys a full time solo career, giving recitals, concertos and chamber music concerts all over Europe, the USA and Japan. He is also an active composer, and his «Viola Spaces », the first phase of an on-going series of concert studies for strings (published in 2010 by Schott) combines ground-breaking innovation in string technique with joyous pleasure in the act of music making. The pieces have been adopted and performed by young string players all over the world.

Garth Knox is Visiting Professor of viola at the Royal Academy of Music in London.

Violist Martin Moriarty is one of Ireland’s foremost musicians and enjoys and active career as a soloist and as a chamber musician both at home and abroad. Martin has received multiple awards and prizes including the Amsterdam Viola Festival Competition, the Flax Trust Award at the Clandeboye Chamber Music Festival and the Peter Pirazzi Stiftung.  As a soloist he has performed with orchestras including the Baden-Baden Philharmonic Orchestra and Amsterdam Sinfonietta under Pavel Baleff and Ed Spanjaard. He recently gave the Czech premier of James MacMillan’s Viola Concerto with the Karlovy Vary Symphony Orchestra under Marc Kissoczy in April 2022.

Martin has performed in venues including the National Concert Hall, Dublin, Het Concertgebouw, Amsterdam, St. Martin-in-the-Fields, Kings Place and St John's Smith Square, London, Franz Liszt Academy of Music Budapest, Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel, Brussels and Ishibashi Memorial Hall, Tokyo.

Festival invitations include West Cork, GAIA, Dovos, Schiermonnikoog, Grachtenfestival, Tsinandali, Holland Music Sessions and Sligo International Chamber Music Festivals. 

Martin has collaborated with artists including Barry Douglas, François Guye, Kirill Troussov, Boris Garlitsky, Philippe Graffin, Daniel Rowland, Nabil Shehata, Alexander Sitkovstsky, Andreas Janke, István Várdai, Finghin Collins, Miklós Lukács, Diamanda Dramm, Julien Hervé, the Vogler, Vanbrugh and Michelangelo String Quartets.
Martin regularly plays with orchestras such as the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Verbier Festival Chamber Orchestra, Irish Chamber Orchestra and guest principal viola for Die Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen and Camerata Freden.

Martin has a great passion for contemporary music, Martin has worked alongside and premiered works by Garth Knox, Gabriel Prokofiev, Sam Perkin, Seán Doherty, Raymond Dean, John Kinsella, Oene Van Geel, Sebastian Fagerlund and Thomas Beijer.

Martin has assisted this teachers in Dublin, Amsterdam and Detmold. He has given solo and chamber music masterclasses at the Ortús Chamber Music Festival in Cork, Ireland.

Martin was invited by the NCH, Dublin to assist Mihaela Martin, Lars Anders Tomter and Frans Helmerson in both solo and chamber music masterclasses last summer. He will return for the masterclass in August 2023.

Martin was the first Irish musician to be accepted into the Verbier Festival Academy as a soloist in 2018 and 2019. Here he worked with world renowned musicians including Tabea Zimmermann, Antoine Tamestit, Ferenc Rados, Gábor Takács-Nagy and Pamela Frank. Since September 2021 he will be the first Irish musician to be apart of the Villa Musica Foundation in Germany.

Martin began his studies at the Young European String School of Music and the Royal Irish Academy of Music in Dublin before following further studies in Amsterdam and Detmold with Nobuko Imai, Marjolein Dispa and Veit Hertenstein. He is currently studying with Lawrence Power at the Zürcher Hochschule der Künste. 

He gave his Vienna Musikverein debut on a European Tour with the Staatskapelle Dresden, his US debut with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, his Asian debut at Suntory Hall in Tokyo, and appeared five times at the Royal Albert Hall for the BBC Proms.

A committed performer of contemporary music, Elschenbroich has commissioned several new works from composers including Mark-Anthony Turnage, Luca Lombardi, Arlene Sierra and Suzanne Farrin. He gave the world premiere of Mark Simpson’s first Cello Concerto – written for him – with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra at Bridgewater Hall, and Brian Elias’ first Cello Concerto at the BBC Proms.

In 2012 he co-founded the Orquesta Filarmonica de Bolivia, the first orchestra to perform a Mahler Symphony in the nation’s history. Elschenbroich returns to Bolivia on a regular basis to lead educational projects and develop the orchestra. This commitment led Elschenbroich to explore the field of conducting with various orchestras across Latin America and the UK. He gave his London conducting debut, leading The Telegraph to write “Elschenbroich gave a performance of Brahms’ 1st Symphony that at times touched the heights.”

Elschenbroich has worked with a number of eminent conductors including Semyon Bychkov, Christoph Eschenbach, Sir Mark Elder, Charles Dutoit, Manfred Honeck, Kirill Karabits, Dmitri Kitajenko, Andrew Litton, Juanjo Mena, Yan-Pascal Tortelier, VasilySinasiky, and Edo De Waart. As soloist he has performed with the London Philharmonic, Royal Philharmonic, Royal Scottish National Orchestra, BBC Philharmonic, BBC Symphony, Royal Liverpool Phiharmonic, Hallé, Bournemouth Symphony, WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne, Konzerthaus OrchesterBerlin, Dresden Staatskapelle, Swedish Radio Symphony, Vienna Tonkünstler Orchestra, Basel Symphony Orchestra, Stavanger Symphony, St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra, Netherlands Philharmonic, Residentie Orchestra, Nagoya Philharmonic, Japan Philharmonic, New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra Washington, Pacific Symphony, Minnesota Orchestra and Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

Elschenbroich’s first three albums for Onyx Classics focused on 20th century Russian repertoire, from Rachmaninov to Schnittke. 2016 saw the release of “Siécle”, a portrait of a century of French music from Saint-Saëns to Dutilleux, recorded with the BBC Scottish Symphony. They have received 5-star reviews from The Telegraph, The Guardian, The Financial Times, as well as receiving Editor’s Choice in Gramophone. This year, after a decade worldwide performances together with Alexei Grynyuk, Onyx Classics released their recording of the complete Beethoven Cello Sonatas. The album received wide critical acclaim, including Editor’s Choice in Gramophone, Album of the Month in BBC Music Magazine, and is also available on vinyl.

His many awards include the Leonard Bernstein Award, Förderpreis Deutschlandfunk and Borletti Buitoni Trust Award. In 2012 he was named BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artist, he was Artist-in-Residence of Deutschlandfunk for the 2014–15 season, and Artist-in-Residence at the Philharmonic Society Bremen from 2013-2016.

Born in 1985 in Frankfurt, Elschenbroich received a scholarship, aged ten, to study at the Yehudi Menuhin School in London. He later studied with Frans Helmerson at the Cologne Music Academy.

He plays a cello made by Matteo Goffriller “Ex-Leonard Rose-Ex-Alfredo Piatti’ (Venice, 1693), on private loan.

Cellist Patrick Moriarty is one of Ireland’s foremost musicians and is in high demand as a soloistand as a chamber musician. He studied at the Young European Strings School of Music with Martin Johnson before moving to London when he was awarded a Scholarship from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama to study with Louise Hopkins and Rebecca Gilliver and was subsequently invited to return as a Chamber Music Fellow. He is a founding member of the award winning Paddington Trio which recently won first prize in the 70th Royal Over-Seas League making their Wigmore Hall debut. They were also the first prizewinner at the NEW FORMATS Project Prize 2022 in Graz, Austria. In 2021, they won 2nd prize and the jury prize for the Best Interpretation of an Estonian Work at the Tallinn International Piano Chamber Music Competition and were invited to become City Music Foundation Artists and Kirckman Concert Society Artists. Patrick has also been awarded the Philip Walsh Memorial Prize, Trisha Maguire Scholarship for outstanding solo playing and has also won prizes in mutual competitions in the RDS Feis Ceolincluding both the Bach and Contemporary Music prize. Recording work includes working with The Abbey Road Studios Institute to record works by E.J Moeran, chamber works by Andres Hillburg and George Walker for BBC Radio 3 as well as recordings for other radio broadcast such as RTE lyric FM, VPRO and YLE. Patrick has performed in venues and festivals such as Wigmore Hall, Barbican Hall, Cadogan Hall, St Martin-in-the-Fields, St John's Smith Square, Victoria Hall in Geneva, Muziekgebouw in Amsterdam, Musiikkitalo in Helsinki, Franz Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest, IMS Prussia Cove Open Chamber Music, West Cork Chamber Music Festival, Westport Chamber Music Festival, Leeds International Concert Series, Schiermonnikoog Festival, GAIAChamber Music Festival, and the Festival de Musique Classique à Sion.

Sandro Meszaros (*2000) is a young, up-and-coming Swiss cellist of Hungarian and Italian descent.

Highlights for him in 2023 include his solo debut with the Orchestra della Svizzera italiana and a chamber music concert with cello legend Mischa Maisky, in which he also performed.

Born in 2000, he began playing the cello at the age of five under Emily Walker. He continued his studies at the CSI (Conservatorio della Svizzera italiana) with Johann Sebastian Paetsch and later with Taisuke Yamashita, the two principal cellists of the OSI (Orchestra della Svizzera italiana). Since 2018 he has been studying with Thomas Grossenbacher at the ZHdK (Zurich University of the Arts).

At the age of 15, he won first prize at the Antonio Salieri Competition in Legnago (Verona), followed by numerous other prizes at national and international competitions.

Since autumn 2022 he has been supported by the Rahn Kulturfonds as a scholarship holder.

As a soloist he performs with various orchestras such as the United Soloist Orchestra, Orchestra Giovanile della Svizzera italiana, the Orchestra Spiez, the Orchestra Konolfingen.

He also performs in various chamber music formations with renowned musicians such as Marco Rizzi, Andreas Janke, Bruno Delepelaire, Yuval Gotlibovich on radio and television (SRF,RSI). He is regularly invited to internationally renowned festivals such as Schubertiade Fribourg, MuriKultur Musik im Festsaal, Seetal Classics, Note D' Autunno, Seuzacher Konzertreihe, Ticino Musica Festival, OberstdorferMusiksommer, Longlake Festival Lugano. Several internationally renowned soloists, including Johannes Goritzki, Enrico Dindo, Jens Peter Maintz, Wen-Sinn Yang, Antonio Meneses, Thomas Grossenbacher, Giovanni Gnocchi, have contributed to his musical growth. Among the various fixed chamber music ensembles with which he performs, the ensemble theXcellos stands out, with which he won first prize in 2018 and first prize with distinction in 2019 at the Swiss Youth Music Competition.

In particular, Sandro Meszaros is characterised by the fact that he seeks new musical inspiration in different genres of art and culture and, above all, in direct exchange with people.

Anton Spronk (1994) is one of the leading young Dutch cellists. In 2019 he was awarded the ‘Prix du Rotary’ at the Verbier Festival. In October of the same year, he also won the 1st prize, Audience Award and Orchestra Award at the International Mazzacurati Cello Competition in Turin. Most recently he won the Dutch Classical Talent Award 2021. Having performed in numerous major halls in Europe, America, and Asia – including the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Carnegie Hall in New York, Tonhalle Zürich, Seoul Arts Center, and the Berliner Philharmonie – Anton is in high demand as a chamber musician as well as a soloist: he has made appearances with orchestras such as the Munich Chamber Orchestra, Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra, Netherlands Chamber Orchestra and the RAI National Symphony Orchestra. Anton is the Artistic Director of Eggenfelden klassisch, a successful international music festival, which he founded in 2016 in collaboration with violinist Larissa Cidlinsky. The instrument Anton plays was built in 1865 by J.B. Vuillaume, a cello generously on loan to him by The Dutch Musical Instruments Foundation.

Like many of his colleagues, Lars Schaper came to the double bass more by chance than through his own impulse. He was first a violinist and went from very small to very big, so to speak. Nevertheless, he soon realised that this was to become his instrument and his profession. In the course of his career, he has played in many great orchestras, is currently in the SWR orchestra under Teodor Currentzis, but has always taken particular pleasure in chamber music. In CHAARTS and smaller formations, Lars always provides the real groove!

Sergei Redkin is one of the most accomplished concert pianists of his generation. He is a laureate of the International Tchaikovsky Competition (2015) and the Concours Reine Elisabeth (2021), the two most prestigious competitions on the music scene.

Sergei Redkin, born in 1991, comes from Krasnoyarsk in Siberia. He began his piano training at the age of six at the State Academy of Music and also received early lessons in improvisation and composition. In 2004, he moved to St. Petersburg, where he studied at the Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatory, first in the special school for the highly gifted, then from 2009 as a regular student in the class of Alexander Sandler. He continued his composition studies with Alexander Mnatsakanyan, one of the last students of Shostakovich. As a scholarship holder of the House of Music in St. Petersburg, Redkin took part in the "International Piano Academy Lake Como" several times from 2011, where he worked with Dmitri Bashkirov, Peter Frankl and Fou Ts'ong, among others.

Sergei tours the world as a soloist, appearing in Japan, New York, Moscow, Munich, Madrid to name a few. In 2018 he was invited by Valery Gergiev for a concert tour to Mexico, Budapest and London. In the same year, Redkin was awarded the Ruhr Piano Festival Prize, for which he was nominated by composer Philip Glass.

Caspar Vos (1988) began his piano studies with Frank Peters at the ArtEZ Conservatory of Music in Arnhem and continued it with Jan Wijn at the Amsterdam Conservatory of Music. Here he obtained his master's degree cum laude. Caspar subsequently took masterclasses with Ferenc Rados, Dimitri Bashkirov, Eldar Nebolsin, Nikolai Lugansky, Severin von Eckardstein & Pavel Nersessian.

Caspar won several prizes at national and international competitions, including a first prize at 'The Grand Dominique Competition' and a second prize at 'The 18th International Piano Competition Jean Francaix' in Paris.

In February 2018, Caspar's debut album Ego was released, featuring exclusively works by Russian composer Nikolaj Medtner. The album received a 10 in Listen and received both national and international rave reviews. Gramophone, for instance, wrote 'Vos brings out (the music's) constantly changing moods with flair and clear affection. Caspar conveys the sense of surge and repose, mystery and exaltation that is such a hallmark of this composer.'

In March 2019, Caspar released his second album entirely dedicated to Catalan composer

Frederic Mompou. This CD was also enthusiastically received. NRC called Restart 'an album to be cherish' and Trouw wrote 'Vos proves once again that he is one of the best Dutch pianists of his generation.'

Besides his performing activities, Caspar is also director of the Schiermonnikoog Festival.

Born in Lugano in 1967, Fabio Di Càsola won first prize at the age of 23 at the International Competition in Geneva (CIEM). It had been 19 years since a clarinettist last took home this award at this, one of the most prestigious music competitions in the world. In the following years, he won the "Grand Prix Patek Philippe", the "Prix Suisse" for contemporary music and the International Competition for Contemporary Music in Stresa. In 1998 he was elected "Swiss Musician of the Year" by the jury and the public in Geneva. He has been professor of clarinet and chamber music at the Zurich University of the Arts since 1991. Since 2006 artistic director of the festival klang. Various CDs as a soloist and as a chamber musician have been released by Sony Classical. Fabio di Càsola is co-founder and member of the Ensemble Kandinsky with Andreas Janke, Thomas Grossenbacher and Benjamin Engeli.

Selen Schaper was born in Istanbul in 1978 and started playing the oboe at the age of 12. Five years later she received the solo English horn position in Istanbul Cemal Resid Rey Staadlichen Symphony Orchestra. In 2002 she went to Germany to further her musical development. She completed her studies with Prof. Diethelm Jonas and Johannes Brüggemann at the Musikhochschule Lübeck. In addition, she received lessons from Christoph Hartmann and David Walter. Since 2009 she has been living in Freiburg, where she works as an oboist and as an oboe teacher. In the last 8 years she has built up her solo career especially on English horn and oboe D'amore repertoire.

After a few years of singing in various bands (e.g. big business, little big men), he became the singer of the celtic folk band "an lar" in 1999. To relieve the multi-instrumentalists, he was practically forced to play the bodhran. He was provided with a bodhran from the Orkney Islands by band colleague Jürg Frey. Jüre, who had already taught other bodhran students, taught him the basics. Soon he looked around for another instrument, as his bodhran had warm basses but little treble. In addition, it was very strenuous to play because the skin was very soft and the shell was too narrow for his height.

Winu Ryser, whom he met at sessions, built him the following two bodhrans according to his wishes. Together they experimented on the right size and the desired sound.

Thanks to a crisis in his traditional profession as a decorator / museum technician, he then put into practice in 2011 what he had had in mind for a long time. He built the first of his own bodhrans and combined his craftsmanship with his musical skills. His ideas on how to improve the instrument were gradually put into practice in the workshop of his friend, Ivan.

Meanwhile he plays his custom-made bodhran for the sound of an lar, the buncrana firecrackers (Menic's acoustic band) and as a guest in the acoustic projects of friends like the project " In Search of a Better Life" with Shirley Grimes and Cliodhna Ni Aodain or Bruno Dietrich.

Some of his fellow musicians also have a suitable instrument from his production today and one can be heard on the current CD " Hold on" by Shirley Grimes and can also be seen in the video clip for "Six million Years".

Als Sängerin, Multiinstrumentalistin oder Performance-Künstlerin nimmt Erika Stucky (*1962) die unterschiedlichsten künstlerischen Identitäten an. Die Musik der Hippiebewegung ihrer Geburtsstadt San Francisco begleitet sie über den Atlantik in ein Oberwalliser Bergdorf, wo sie ab dem neunten Lebensjahr aufwächst. Früh taucht sie in die Schweizer Volksmusiktraditionen ein, studiert Pantomime am Teatro Dimitri sowie Schauspiel und Jazzgesang in Paris. Ihre transatlantischen Prägungen verbindet die Schweiz-Amerikanerin zu einer vokalen Aktionskunst zwischen Jodel und Blues, mit der sie seit mehr als 35 Jahren immer aufs Neue überrascht: Mit ihren Formationen The Sophisticrats oder Bubbles & Bones, als Jimi Hendrix-Interpretin an der Seite von Christy Doran oder in einer Woodstock-Hommage von The Young Gods. Ebenso als Mrs God in Sybille Bergs Theaterstück «Helges Leben», im Duett mit dem Countertenor Andreas Scholl oder als Stimme der Hexen in der Inszenierung von Henry Purcells «Dido and Aeneas». Stets «seriös avantgardistisch» und «serious fun».

Evelyn and Kristina Brunner have been making music together since childhood. Starting from the musical foundations they received from their father in the family band, they have continuously developed traditional Swiss folk music for themselves. With "Schwyzerörgeli”, cello and double bass, they have a unique sound inspired by a wide variety of styles, although which never loses touch with traditional folk music.

Kristina Brunner (*1993) studied cello with a focus on folk music (bachelor's degree) and "Schwyzerörgeli” with Markus Flückiger (bachelor's and master's degree) at the Lucerne University of Music. Since 2019 she has been teaching the “Schwyzerörgeli” at music schools in the Gürbetal region and the city of Lucerne. In addition, she maintains an active concert schedule, especially in duo with Evelyn Brunner and Albin Brun.

Evelyn Brunner (*1990) studied music and movement pedagogy at the Lucerne School of Music. In addition to a broad pedagogical education, she received double bass and “Schwyzerörgeli” lessons there. Evelyn Brunner teaches “Schwyzerörgeli” at music schools in Thun and Bern, leads folk music courses and is active in the field of folk, performing and participating in various projects and bands.

The Armenian composer Aregnaz Martirosyan (*1993) studied piano at the Romanos Melikyan Conservatory of Music in Yerevan and composition at the Komitas State Conservatory of Music with Vartan Adjemian.

Since 2019 she has been studying at the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts in Dieter Ammann's composition class.

Martirosyan has received composition commissions from the Basel Sinfonietta ("KRAFT", 2022), the Sinfonie Orchester Biel Solothurn ("Zeitlos", 2021), the Intercontinental Ensemble Amsterdam ("Emotional Diversity", 2020), the Armenian National Philharmonic ("Dreilinden", 2020) and the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music ("Chamelion", 2022)", among others.

Her music is presented internationally at the Grachtenfestival Amsterdam, the Munich Biennials, the Festival Alpentöne, the Darmstädter Ferienkurse and the New Music Days Luzern, among others.

In 2018, she was awarded 1st prize at the "Sayat-Nova" competition in New York and won the "Armenian National Philharmonic Orchestra Award".

In 2022, her piece "501-502" was performed by graduates of the International Ensemble Modern Academy Frankfurt as part of the Composer Seminar of the Lucerne Festival Academy.

Master classes with composers such as Wolfgang Rihm, Heinz Holliger, George Aperghis, Krzysztof Penderecki, and others round off her education.

Urs Peter Schneider, born in Bern, is a composer and improviser, interpreter, and teacher. He studied in Bern, Cologne, and Vienna until 1966 and then moved to Biel where he has lived since. Since 1963 he has been active as a pianist, duo partner of the pianist and soprano Erika Radermacher, his first wife, and later also as a virtuoso speaker and performer. Urs Peter Schneider has authored over 150 compositions in all genres, with a preference for conceptual and chamber music (over 2500 performances). Since 1968 he has been director of the "Ensemble Neue Horizonte Bern", which he founded mainly for Swiss and American New Music (over 800 performances).

In 1966 and 2009 he won the Soloist Prize as well as Composition Prize of the Swiss Association of Musicians, and in 1983 and 2006 he was awarded Culture Prizes from the Canton of Berne and the City of Biel, among others.

Until 2002 Schneider was professor at the "Hochschule für Musik" in Bern, focusing on theoretical, practical and interdisciplinary subjects. Since 1988, he has been the partner of the performer and spatial designer Marion Leyh, who became his second wife. His book publications include "Komponieren 1955 bis 1988" (published in 1989), "Das Umbiel" (2008), "Konzeptuelle Musik" (2016) and "Schriften I bis V – Texte für als mit zur Musik". To date he has made over 20 recordings with numerous, multimedia compositions.

In the age of musical specialisation, Marc Kilchenmann has pursued a broader approach to the profession by practising as a generalist. Before his PhD, he studied bassoon and composition and took courses in 'Elementary Music Pedagogy' and 'Research on the Arts'.

Today he works as a researcher, university lecturer, composer, conceptual musician, improviser, chamber musician, music educator, programme designer and publisher. The creation of contemporary music is central to all Marc Kilchenmann’s areas of work. In recent years, he has increasingly focused on the disciplines of composition and improvisation and carries out intensive musicological research in the field of New Music. In addition to studies on Hermann Meier, he dealt with the formal constitution of the complete works of Jean Barraqué and wrote a dissertation on the 'Just Intonation' of the US composer Ben Johnston.

(born 1979 in Stuttgart) is an art historian, journalist and musician based in various express trains. He studied art history, philosophy, media art and anglistics. From 2007 through 2009 he held a grant from the German Research Foundation for the graduate school Image Body Medium at the University of Arts and Design in Karlsruhe (HfG) where he was awarded his PhD for a thesis on the myth of Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2011. From 2009-2012, he worked as a researcher at the Swiss Institute for Art Research in Zurich and as assistant professor at the University of Siegen (2009, 2011-2013). He became permanent lecturer at the Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK) in 2012. From 2013–2016, he was co-head of photography at the ZHdK, subsequently head of theory of the BA Fine Arts (2016–2019). In 2019, he was appointed professor of art history in the department fine arts at the ZHdK. Since 2022, he has been head of the SNF-research project "Contemporary Art, Popular Culture, and Peacebuilding in Eastern Europe". He gave lectures at universities and museums among others in Cyprus, Germany, France, Hong Kong, Italy, Canada, Lithuania, Mexico, Poland, Romania, Switzerland, Taiwan, USA. Besides, he had teaching assignments at the HfG, the Staatliche Akademie der Bildenden Künste Stuttgart, the Akademie für Darstellende Kunst Ludwigsburg, the Taipei National University of the Arts and the Uniwersytet Artystyczny w Poznaniu where he has been guest professor since 2014. His research is focused on physical culture (emphasis on bodybuilding), exhibition history, Eastern European art and culture, popular culture and pop music (emphasis on heavy metal). In 2013, he was curator of the "Salon Suisse" at the 55th Venice Art Biennale, in 2015/16 he curated the exhibition "Building Modern Bodies. The Art of Bodybuilding" for the Kunsthalle Zurich, in 2021 "Metalmorphosen" for the oxyd Kunsträume Winterthur. He is member of the commission for art in public space of the city of Zurich. His essays and reviews appear regularly in, a.o., DIE ZEIT, NZZ, FAZ, Schweizer Monat, Camera Austria, frieze magazine, Psychologie Heute. In 2017 he was awarded the ADKV-Art-Cologne Award for Art Criticism. Since 2018 he has been columnist for the Stuttgarter Zeitung, since 2019 contributing editor of the frieze magazine, since 2021 columnist for Psychologie Heute. Besides, he is the singer and bass player of the trash (without "h"!) metal duo Malmzeit (founded in 2003) who run a heavy metal delivery service. In the early 1990s he started weight training and has been pumping iron ever since (workout clips from 2019 1/2). Scheller is a certified fitness instructor (Dr. Gottlob Institute).