german hornsound & Christoph Eß
Biography german hornsound & Christoph Eß
The horn quartet “german hornsound”
was founded in 2009 by four former students of Professor Christian Lapert’s horn class at the University of Music and Performing Arts, Stuttgart. All four horn players currently hold positions in professional orchestras: the Württemberg Philharmonic Orchestra in Reutlingen, the State Opera in Hanover, the Berlin Concert House Orchestra and the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra.
The ensemble’s repertoire comprises all epochs of music history including both original works and arrangements. german hornsound’s own arrangements also offer more programme variety than the established horn quartet repertoire.
Since its inception, german hornsound has repeatedly been invited to play at festivals such as the “Festival Mitte Europa”, the festival summer at Schloss Seehof and the “Ebracher Musiksommer”.
For 2013, german hornsound has developed their own project in cooperation with the well-known South Tyrolean author, Herbert Rosendorfer, and the Berlin dramaturg, Karl-Dietrich Gräwe, to honour the anniversaries of both Richard Wagner and Giuseppe Verdi. The quartet will perform this opera fragment in three acts, called “Siegfried and Violetta”, at leading festivals such as the “Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival”, the “Festspiele Mecklenburg-Vorpommern”, the “Oberstdorfer Musiksommer”, the “Vielklang-Sommer Tübingen”, as well as the “Festival zwischen Inn und Salzach”.
Further performances will take place in Nuremberg, Chur and Davos.
In the summer of 2013, german hornsound will also premiere (in cooperation with the Bavarian broadcaster “Bayerischer Rundfunk”) a commissioned composition of the Norwegian composer Trygve Madsen for four horns and orchestra with the Bavarian Youth Orchestra.
Christoph Eß
is one of the leading French horn players of his generation. In addition to performing as the Principle French Horn of the Bamberger Symphoniker he is also much in demand as a soloist and chamber music partner and has been a prizewinner at numerous international competitions. Eß studied with Prof. Christian Lampert at the Musikhochschule in Stuttgart where he is now on faculty. Christoph Eß won the 2005 ARD International Music Competition in Munich and in 2007 won the internationally renowned Prague Spring International Music Competition. In 2008 he was honored with the WEMAG Solo Performance Prize of the Festspiele Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and in 2009 won a scholarship from the Deutscher Musikwettbewerb. In 2011 he was accepted into the Orpheum Foundation for the Advancement of Young Soloists. Christoph Eß appears in concert as a horn soloist with leading orchestras such as the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, the Bamberger Symphoniker, Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich, the Radio-Sinfonieorchester Berlin and the Munich, Stuttgart, and Salzburg chamber orchestras. In 2007 he gave a widely praised debut performance at the Berlin Philharmonie with the Symphonie-Orchester Berlin. Eß collaborates with conductors such as Jonathan Nott, Yakov Kreizberg, Rafael Frübeck de Burgos, Christoph Poppen, Michael Hofstetter, and Michael Sanderling. He is also an avid performer of chamber music and works with various formations including Christian Zacharias, Andreas Scholl, the Fauré Quartet, the Zemlinsky Quartet, Quatour Ebène, Boris Kusnezow, and Viviane Hagner.
