Jun Märkl is a highly respected interpreter of core Germanic repertoire and is renowned for his refined and idiomatic explorations of the French Impressionists. He currently serves as music director of the Taiwan National Symphony Orchestra and the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, and is the chief conductor of the Residentie Orchestra of The Hague, Netherlands. He is also principal guest conductor of the Oregon Symphony.

Märkl’s expertise in the world of opera and long relationships with the state operas of Vienna, Berlin, Munich, Berlin, Semperoper Dresden, The Metropolitan Opera, San Francisco Opera and New National Theatre in Tokyo have been complemented over the past decades by his orchestral music directorships of the Orchestre National de Lyon, MDR Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra, Basque National Orchestra and the Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra. Märkl regularly guest conducts leading international orchestras, and has led The Philadelphia Orchestra, the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra and NHK Symphony Orchestra, Tokyo, among many others.

He also has an extensive discography of over 55 recordings, and in 2012 he was honoured with the Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. He studied in Munich with Sergiu Celibidache and at Tanglewood with Leonard Bernstein and Seiji Ozawa. Märkl is highly dedicated to work with young musicians: for many years he worked as principal conductor at the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo and the Aspen Music Festival in Colorado. He teaches as a guest professor at the Kunitachi College of Music, Tokyo and recently founded the National Youth Symphony Orchestra of Taiwan.

www.junmarkl.com

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Ralph van Raat has been completely fascinated by the classical music of the 20th century since the age of fourteen. Although his repertoire ranges from Bach to Boulez, his primary focus has always been on composers from Debussy, Bartók and Ives to present day masters. His aim is to convince his audiences of the immense beauty and diversity of the music of our own time through solo recitals, lecture-recitals, concerto performances, album releases and special projects. Van Raat helps audiences identify with modern day composers by adhering to a classical approach: he firmly believes that a strong sense of classical structure as well as a refinement of tone is essential in conveying the logic and poetry of any music.

This has not gone unrecognised: he is the recipient of a substantial number of national and international awards, many composers have written solo works for him, and he has performed over 50 piano concertos with orchestras worldwide such as the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra and the BBC Symphony Orchestra. He has also recorded over 30 albums. Van Raat is a frequent speaker and performer on radio and television shows, and teaches at both the Conservatorium van Amsterdam and the Accademia di Musica di Pinerolo, Turin in between his busy concert schedule. Van Raat was named a Steinway Artist in 2003.

For more information, visit www.ralphvanraat.com.

Interview with Ralph van Raat

Opening Doors: Ralph van Raat talks to Jeremy Siepmann

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Simone Young has been Artistic Director of the Hamburg State Opera and Chief Music Director of the Hamburg Philharmonic since August 2005. She has conducted here a broad musical spectrum of premieres and repertoire performances ranging from Mozart, Verdi, Puccini, Wagner and Strauss to Hindemith, Britten and Henze. At the State Opera and with the Hamburg Philharmonic, she has been able to achieve great successes with world premieres and several German premieres. Simone Young has made an international name for herself as a Wagner conductor: she was music director of several complete cycles of the Ring of the Nibelung at the Vienna State Opera and the State Opera Unter den Linden in Berlin. She forged her own Ring with great success at the Hamburg State Opera, conducting the complete cycle here as well. Engagements led the Sydney-born conductor to all the leading opera houses of the world, including the Vienna State Opera, the Opéra National de Paris, the Royal Opera House Covent Garden in London, the Bavarian State Opera, the Metropolitan Opera in New York and the Los Angeles Opera. Alongside her extensive operatic activities, Simone Young has also made a name for herself on the concert podium. She has worked with all the leading orchestras, including the Vienna Philharmonic, the Berlin Philharmonic and the London Philharmonic Orchestra. Simone Young directed the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra as Principal Conductor from 1999 until 2002 and was Artistic Director and Principal Conductor of the Australian Opera in Sydney and Melbourne from January 2001 until December 2003. From 2007 until 2013 she also was Principal Guest Conductor of the Lisbon Gulbenkian Orchestra.

Simone Young appears on numerous recordings. For example, alongside recordings from the Hamburg State Opera such as Mathis der Maler, Das Rheingold, Die Walküre, Siegfried and Götterdämmerung on OehmsClassics, there are also several recordings with the Hamburg Philharmonic. Among others, ten Bruckner symphonies have been issued as well as the Second and the Sixth Symphony of Gustav Mahler and the symphonies of Johannes Brahms.

Simone Young has received numerous prizes and awards. She is an honorary doctor of the Universities of Sydney and Melbourne, Professor at the Academy of Music and Theatre in Hamburg, a member of the Order of Australia and a “Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres” as well as a recipient of the Goethe Medal. She was honoured as “Conductor of the Year” for her first opera season in Hamburg, and also received the Schleswig-Holstein Brahms Prize. In 2009, together with the Hamburg Philharmonic, she made the Hanseatic City into the world’s largest concert hall – from the Michel Tower, she conducted 100 musicians at 50 locations throughout the city.

In 2012 Simone Young, the Hamburg Philharmonic and soloists of the Hamburg State Opera presented Wagner’s Das Rheingold and Mahler’s Second Symphony in Brisbane, Australia, for which Young received the Helpmann Award in the category of “Best Individual Classical Music Performance” in 2013.

Translation: David Babcock

Bruckner’s 200th anniversary: Interview with Simone Young on Symphony No. 6 (Gramophone)

Feature interview: At 200, Bruckner Is More Popular Than Ever With Conductors. Why? (The New York Times)

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Internationally acclaimed conductor Leonard Slatkin is Music Director Laureate of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra (DSO), Directeur Musical Honoraire of the Orchestre National de Lyon (ONL), and Conductor Laureate of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra. He maintains a rigorous schedule of guest conducting throughout the world and is active as a composer, author, and educator. Slatkin has received six GRAMMY awards and 35 nominations.

One of his recent recordings is the world premiere of Alexander Kastalsky’s Requiem for Fallen Brothers commemorating the 100th anniversary of the armistice ending World War I. Other recent Naxos releases include works by Saint-Saëns, Ravel, and Berlioz (with the ONL) and music by Copland, Rachmaninov, Borzova, McTee, and John Williams (with the DSO). In addition, he has recorded the complete Brahms, Beethoven, and Tchaikovsky symphonies with the DSO (available online as digital downloads).

A recipient of the prestigious National Medal of Arts, Slatkin also holds the rank of Chevalier in the French Legion of Honor. He has received the Prix Charbonnier from the Federation of Alliances Françaises, Austria’s Decoration of Honor in Silver, the League of American Orchestras’ Gold Baton Award, and the 2013 ASCAP Deems Taylor Special Recognition Award for his debut book, Conducting Business. A second volume, Leading Tones: Reflections on Music, Musicians, and the Music Industry, was published by Amadeus Press in 2017. His latest book, Classical Crossroads: The Path Forward for Music in the 21st Century (2021), is available through Rowman & Littlefield.

Slatkin has conducted virtually all the leading orchestras in the world. As Music Director, he has held posts in New Orleans; St. Louis; Washington, DC; London (with the BBC Symphony Orchestra); Detroit; and Lyon, France. He has also served as Principal Guest Conductor in Pittsburgh, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, and Cleveland.

www.leonardslatkin.com

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