Every voice counts in the Ensemble Berthilo: two female singers and two male singers, all classically trained and members of various semi-professional choirs and ensembles in the Freiburg area. Performances in sacred and secular settings define the repertoire of the ensemble, which, under the direction of Zsófia Csákány, is enthusiastically dedicated to vocal music from the 16th century to the present day. In a transparent quartet formation, the ensemble’s Advent concert explores the rich sounds of Christmas music from Spain to Hungary to Norway, from Schütz, Buxtehude and Kodály to Gjeilo. Advent sounds that put the heart and spirit in the mood for Christmas.
Maja Blomenkamp, soprano
Edda Güntert, alto
Simon Dreher, tenor
Johannes Güntert, bass
At the late Baroque Stein organ of Betberg Church: Zsófia Csákány.
Programme
J.S. Bach/Siloti: Prelude h-moll
S.Rachmaninov: Prelude h-moll op.32 n.10
R. Schumann: Concert sans Orchestre op.14
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J. Cage: In a landscape
C. Debussy: La terrasse des audiences du clair de lune; Bruyérès; La puerta del viño;
Christophe Guyard (1966): Fantasia, world premiere – dedicated to Daniela Manusardi
Daniela Manusardi – Pianist & Composer
Born in Milan, pianist and composer Daniela Manusardi received her first lessons from her father, the internationally acclaimed pianist Guido Manusardi, and from Prof. Carlo Balzaretti. At the age of ten, she began studying piano at the Conservatorio ‘G. Verdi’ in Milan, adding composition at thirteen – she graduated with honours in both subjects.
She furthered her artistic training in Germany with Prof. Tomislav N. Baynov and Prof. Ákos Hernádi, as well as in masterclasses with Karl-Heinz Kämmerling and Rudolf Kehrer, among others. She has won several international competitions and was honoured as a ‘sound virtuoso’ by the Otmar Alt Foundation in 2006.
Daniela Manusardi performs regularly at renowned festivals in Europe, the USA and Asia, including Prima Diffusa at La Scala in Milan, the Valtidone Festival, the International Festival of Cervo, Swiss Radio Lugano, the Bechstein Centre in Düsseldorf and the Yamaha Festival in Bangkok. She has been a member of the Baynov Piano Ensemble since 2003.
Radio and television recordings as well as CD recordings for Lira Classic and Limen music & arts document her wide-ranging work. As a teacher, she has taught at international master classes, including in Hammelburg, Marktoberdorf and at Assumption University Bangkok.
Since 2016, Daniela Manusardi has been Professor of Piano and Head of the Piano Department at the Conservatorio ‘G. Verdi’ in Como.
Programme
Music by Manuel De Falla, Modest Mussorgsky, W.A. Mozart and Domenico Scarlatti in versions for one and two guitars
The evocative, ghostly world in Manuel de Falla’s ballet ‘The Magic of Love’ could not sound more Spanish than in the version for two guitars, harpsichord sonatas by Scarlatti could not be more nuanced and colourful than in the artistic versions for solo guitar by Prof. Michael Hampel, and Phileas Baun shows with movements from Modest Mussorgsky’s ‘Pictures at an Exhibition’ how virtuoso, spectacular and above all expressive a solo guitar can sound. Rarely does an audience experience the guitar in so many facets within a single concert.
Michael Hampel and Phileas Baun both teach at the Musikhochschule in Freiburg. Both are successful soloists and chamber musicians and have made a name for themselves with unusual and award-winning concert formats. Michael Hampel and Phileas Baun teach guitar at the University of Music in Freiburg. Both are successful soloists and experienced chamber musicians in a wide variety of constellations, often with unusual, award-winning concert formats.
Michael Hampel is Professor of Guitar at the Freiburg/Breisgau University of Music. Prior to this, he taught at the Trossingen University of Music from 1994 and most recently worked as head of the university. After his studies in Frankfurt/M, Trossingen and Salzburg, he began an international concert career. Tours have taken him regularly to Asia and South America, among other places, with many recordings and live broadcasts.
From 2017 to 2019, he was a visiting professor at Tongji University in Shanghai. In addition to teaching at the Freiburg University of Applied Sciences, his artistic work in recent years has focussed on developing new concert formats incorporating digital and scenic concepts.
Phileas Baun studied guitar, conducting and early music in The Hague, Trossingen and Basel and is at home with his own projects and world premieres in contemporary and experimental music as well as on the classical concert stage. He has won numerous competitions and has been teaching ‘Guitar Extended Competence Spectrum’ at the University of Music in Freiburg since 2021.
Previous projects include co-productions with IRCAM Paris, world premieres at the Donaueschinger Musiktage 2018 and world premieres at the Crossroads Festival Salzburg 2019. In 2024, he won the most important Swiss live event prize ‘Xaver’ for his performance at the opening show of the national hockey final in the stadium in Fribourg/CH, broadcast live on Swiss television SRF.
Programme
Franz Liszt (1811-1886)
Nuages gris
Ballade Nr. 2 h-moll S 171
Sursum corda S 163/7
Les jeux d’eaux à la Villa d’Este
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György Ligeti (1923-2006)
Musica ricercata: III-XI
György Orbán (1947*)
French suite
Liszt and Ligeti in Laufen – piano concert with Prof Judit Gábos at Gutshof Güntert
‘Musica pura’ is the name of the new concert series founded by the musician Zsófia Csákány, who is well known in the region, and the musicologist and literary scholar Dr Edda Güntert. The concept also includes exciting juxtapositions that invite you to question the usual listening canon.
In her programme, piano professor Judit Gábos, who works at the Eszterházy University of Music in Eger, combines two of Hungary’s most important composers, who are not only linked by their synaesthetic perception of sound and their experimental boundary shifting, but also met in Stanley Kubrick’s film music: Franz Liszt and György Ligeti.
It becomes audible how advanced and far-reaching Liszt’s piano work was, for example in the late ‘Nuages gris’ and – despite all the astonishing virtuosity, for example in the ‘Jeux d’eaux à la Villa d’Este’ – cannot be reduced to pure ‘keyboard lionism’. Works such as ‘Musica ricercata’, on the other hand, demonstrate against the backdrop of Liszt’s tonal language rooted in the 19th century that breaking with tradition is also a dialogue with tradition. A demanding, appealing and moving musical dialogue – with an introduction by Dr Edda Güntert.
Judit Gábos is a Hungarian concert pianist and a piano professor at the Music Institute of Eszterházy Károly Catholic University of Eger. In 2003 received DMA in piano performance from the Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest and in 2012 obtained a habilitation also in piano performance from the Liszt Academy.
In 2000-2006 played numerous live solo and chamber music recitals at the Hungarian Radio, also performing regularly at the Liszt Museum in Budapest, played at the Spring Festival of Budapest, Pecs and Eger.
In Europe gave solo and chamber music concerts in Belgium, Finland, Serbia, Spain. In Romania has been frequently soloist of the State Philharmonics of Targu-Mures. In the United States played Bartók (Concerto no.3 for piano and orchestra, the Sonata for two pianos and percussions) and also all-Bartók recitals in New York (2013, 2015), Canada (Ottawa, Toronto, Vancouver).
In 2011, as a Fulbright grantee, played concerts and recitals honouring the Liszt bicentenary.
As a pianist and professor, also visited other countries, as Indonesia (2013), Brazil (2014, 2017), India (2016, 2019), New Zealand (2018), Argentina (2022), Chile (2024).
In Spring 2019, collaborated with the dance company of Eger (Gárdonyi Géza Dance ensemble) in the dance phantasy “Hungarian Rhapsody”, playing Liszt works as live performances in Eger and Budapest.
Outside Europe and the North American continent, also toured Indonesia, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, India, New Zealand.