PIANO*FEST*AUSTRIA

FACULTY

ROBERT LEHRBAUMER (Vienna), piano, conducting

One of Austria's most renowned interpreters: celebrated pianist, organist and conductor. Born in Vienna, Robert Lehrbaumer started his career at the age of 9 when he made his appearance as a pianist in Austria, Germany and Switzerland. Since then, concert tours have brought him to almost all European countries and capitals, to North, Central and South America, to the Near East, South-East Asia, Korea, and Japan, in famous locations from Vienna's Musikverein und Konzerthaus to New York's Carnegie-Hall and Tokyo's Casals Hall. Robert Lehrbaumer began to study piano at the age of six. From 8 to 13 he was a member of the Mozart Boys Choir. Two years later, he entered the Vienna University of Music and Dramatic Art to study piano, organ, and conducting. Prizes in numerous competitions, especially Geneva 1985, and scholarships by Boesendorfer and the Alban Berg Stiftung distinguish the young interpreter.

When he was 11, he had his first appearance as a soloist with orchestras and has since performed concerts with the Vienna Philharmonic, the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Bruckner Orchestra/Linz the Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg, the Camerata Academica Salzburg, the Vienna Chamber Orchestra and with many foreign orchestras under the baton of conductors such as Claudio Abbado, Yehudi Menuhin, Sandor Vegh, Andre Previn, Leopold Hager.

Musical partnerships with Wolfgang Schneiderhan, Anton Dermota, Walter Berry, Angelika Kirchschlager, Bo Skovhus, Friedrich Gulda, Rudolf Schock, Philippe Entremont and others. Robert Lehrbaumer pursued his careers as an organist and as a pianist simultaneously. His special piano-organ-recitals, also with orchestras, are very popular events for which he gets rave reviews. He has participated in numerous festivals such as the Vienna Festival, Salzburg Festival, Brucknerfest/Linz, Carinthian Summer/Ossiach, Bregenz Spring, Luzern Music Festival, the Nuremberg Organ-Week, Slovakia Spring-Festival, Schubert-Festival/Washington D.C., Festival Cervantino/ Mexico. At the age of 25, he played a solo-recital in the cycle "Master-Soloists" in the Vienna Konzerthaus, together with Abbado, Sinopoli, Previn, Caballe, Brendel.

In addition, Robert Lehrbaumer has made recordings for radio and TV stations, LP and CD; he has starred in films and videos. He teaches at International master courses in Austria and abroad and holds master classes at the University of Music in Vienna and at universities in USA and Mexico and Asia. Member of juries of international competitions. President of the international piano competition "Zagreb 2006." When conducting Robert Lehrbaumer is known also performing both as conductor and pianist in works of Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Gershwin, Poulenc.

Languages of instruction: German, English

ROBERT WARD (Los Angeles), piano, conducting

pursues an active international career as pianist, orchestral conductor, chamber musician, artistic director of music festivals, juror at international competitions, and master teacher. He has received numerous awards and honors, including the Prix di Positano for outstanding performance of Beethoven's piano music, an Austrian Government Grant for study with Professor Dieter Weber at the Akademie fur Musik in Vienna, and Carlo Zecchi at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, and a Fulbright Award for study in Italy with Wilhelm Kempff. A native of Illinois, his early teachers were former pupils of Isabelle Vengerova, Artur Schnabel, and Emil von Sauer, one of the last pupils of Franz Liszt. Later in New York, he coached with Dorothy Taubman.

Long admired for his performances of the Viennese classical composers, Robert Ward is also a proponent of American music, giving many first performances abroad. He first came to international attention when he introduced Samuel Barber's Piano Concerto during a 10-country tour of South America sponsored by the U.S. State Department. He is a foremost interpreter of the music of George Gershwin, reflected by numerous appearances with orchestras across the country, and of John Cage.

With colleagues from Vienna, he founded and served as Artistic Director of Piano*Fest*Austria, an international festival in Bad Aussee, Austria. The festival featured a chamber orchestra from Bratislava in-residence to perform cycles of Mozart and Beethoven Piano Concerti. To celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Altenburger Musik Akademie, we are pleased to announce that Robert Ward brings this exciting program to AMA.

In addition to his pianistic and scholarly activities, Robert Ward is a founding director of the California Philharmonic orchestra in Los Angeles. Making his conducting debut at age 17, he has conducted college and professional orchestras in the U.S. and a Mozart Concerto course in Prague.

Renowned as a master teacher, he has produced prize-winning students in national and international competitions. In 2002, the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts honored Robert Ward as a Distinguished Teacher in the Arts for inspiring young artists and "having the most profound influence on their artistic development." Professor Ward has taught on the faculties of the University of Southern California and UCLA in Los Angeles, and is currently Professor of Piano at California State University and Occidental College. He is active at summer festivals world-wide, including the Liszt Piano Academy in Sopron, Hungary; Corso Internazionale di Musica da Camera in Positano, Italy; and at Tunghai University in Taiwan. He is an artistic adviser to the AMEROPA Festival in Prague and teaches privately in Vienna each summer.

Languages of instruction: English, German

MIN KWON (New York City), piano, accompanying

Pianist Min Kwon is currently a professor of piano at the Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University in New Jersey. She has taught piano minor and chamber music at the Juilliard School and was an artist performer and teacher at the Kuhmo International Chamber Music Festival in Finland. In demand as a performer, teacher, and journalist, she has concertized extensively in over 40 countries. With her sister, violinist Yoon Kwon, the duo made extensive tours in the USA culminating in over 200 recitals, and became the first Korean artists ever to record for the BMG /RCA Red Seal label in 1996.

As soloist, Min Kwon has appeared at the Aspen Music Festival with James Conlon, at Lincoln Center's Avery Fisher Hall with Stanislaw Skrowaczewski, and with the Philadelphia, Fort Worth, New Jersey, Atlanta, North Carolina Symphonies, among many others. She was the official pianist for the New York String Orchestra’s Chamber Music Seminar at Carnegie Hall and the principle keyboardist of the Chicago Civic Orchestra under Daniel Barenboim.

An avid chamber musician, Min Kwon has collaborated with such artists as Leif Ove Andsnes, Benjamin Schmid, Arnold Steinhardt of the Guarneri Quartet, and with the principal players of the New York Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony, Metropolitan Opera Orchestra and the Philadelphia Orchestra. Recital and chamber music appearances also include festivals of Ravinia, Caramoor, and Cape & Islands (USA), Colmar, (France), Freiburg (Germany), Kuhmo (Finland), and Interlaken (Switzerland). Recent performances include debuts in Norway and Estonia and the Asian Premiere of Paul Schoenfield’s Piano Concerto in Korea.

Kwon was accepted by the Curtis Institute of Music at the age of 14 (studying with Eleanor Sokoloff, Leon Fleisher), and graduated with a Bachelor of Music at the age 19. She received her Master’s and Doctorate degrees from the Juilliard School in New York (studying with Martin Canin), where she was the winner of the Gina Bachauer International Piano Awards and the Beethoven Competition. She has also captured top prizes in the international competitions in Jaen (Spain), Calabria (Italy), and Glasgow (Scotland). She has also studied with Hans Leygraf at the Mozarteum in Salzburg.

ILDIKO RAIMONDI (Vienna), lied and opera master class

Ildiko Raimondi ldikó Raimondi was born in Arad/Romania and now resides in Vienna. As a member of the Vienna Staatsoper, in the last season she has appeared as Susanna/LE NOZZE DI FIGARO (under the baton of Seiji Ozawa), Rosalinde/DIE FLEDERMAUS, Lauretta/GIANNI SCHICCHI, Antonia/LES CONTES D'HOFFMANN, Mimì/LA BOHÈME, Nedda/I PAGLIACCI, Yvonne/JONNY SPIELT AUF (under Seiji Ozawa) and Anja/DER RIESE VOM STEINFELD. At the Bayerische Staatsoper in Munich she has sung Rosalinde and Pamina/DIE ZAUBERFLÖTE at the Staatsoper unter den Linden in Berlin.

Besides her activities on the opera stage Ildikó Raimondi opened the 2003/04 season with Haydn's HARMONIEMESSE (Haydn Festival in Eisenstadt) under the baton of Adam Fischer, Schmidt´s DAS BUCH MIT SIEBEN SIEGELN as well as MOZART ARIAS with the Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg under Leopold Hager in Pisa and Verona. At the Vienna Musikverein she was soloist of the concert „Christmas in Vienna" and sang Lieder by Hugo Wolff at a jubilee concert in the year of Wolff´s anniversary. Invited by Zubin Mehta, she appeared as Susanna/LE NOZZE DI FIGARO with Israel Philharmonic in Tel Aviv.

In autumn 2003 Ildikó Raimondi presented Goethe-Lieder by Wenzel Johann Tomaschek, edited by herself, in Vienna Musikverein. Besides her extensive activities on the concert stage she is also renowned for her recitals: with accompanists such as Charles Spencer, Graham Johnson or David Lutz she gave recitals in Milano, Roma, Luxembourg, Amsterdam, Bern, Weimar and Vienna. Ildikó Raimondi has built her career in singing under such renowned conductors as D. R. Davies, V. Fedosejev, A. Fischer, R. Frühbeck de Burgos, L. Hager, N. Harnoncourt, F. Luisi, Sir Ch. Mackerras, Z. Mehta, R. Muti, Sir R. Norrington, S. Ozawa, P. Schreier, H. Stein and F. Welser-Möst and has worked with orchestras such as the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, Vienna Symphonic Orchestra, Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg, Camerata Academica Salzburg, Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestre de la Suisse Romande Genève and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra. She is a regular guest at many important opera stages such as Deutsche Oper Berlin, Staatsoper Dresden, Opernhaus Zurich, etc.

Ildikó Raimondi has been invited to sing at the Vienna Festival, Wiener Musiksommer, Salzburg Festival, Bregenz Festival, Edinburgh Festival, San Sebastián Festival and the Busseto Festival as well as at the Attergauer Kultursommer and the Gmunden Festival. An extensive discography completes her activities.Future projects include appearances at the Haydn Festspiele Eisenstadt, Wörthersee-Classics, Schubert Festival Steyr and the Ludwigsburger Schlossfestspiele. In spring 2004 Ildikó Raimondi was appointed the honorary title of „Kammersängerin" and awarded the Pro-Cultura-Hungarica medal.

MARGIT FUSSI (Vienna), accompanying

Margit Fussi Margit Fussi performs as a piano soloist, as an accompanist for singers and instrumentalists (Hans Hotter, Kim Borg, Iliana Cotrubas, Robert Holl, Elly Ameling, Kurt Equiluz, Graziella Sciutti et al.), as well as and organist and harpsichordist.

She has been the accompanist for master classes in Vienna, Heidelberg, Stuttgart, Berlin, Aldeborough, Matsue, Osaka, Nagoya, Cleveland.

She has been a teacher for Lied-accompanist in Tokyo, Matsue, Hamamatsu as well as in Seoul and at the Vienna Master Classes. She can be credited with many CD and radio recordings.