Renee Allen & Zvi Meniker
Biography Renee Allen & Zvi Meniker
Renee Allen
I can't imagine my life without the Alexander Technique. AT has relieved my headaches, improved my posture, changed my gait, given my yoga practice a different dimension, given resonance to my voice, made my limbs supple, gave my movements strength and lightness, improved my concentration, relieved my stage fright, deepened and calmed my breathing. It has given my job as a concert horn player more joy and security, increased my imagination, improved access to my intuition and strengthened my confidence in my abilities. And there are still new discoveries to be made, on all possible levels.
Born in Montreal, Canada, graduated from McGill University in music in 1978. Orchestral work in Canada until moving to Germany in 1981. From 1981 to 1990 horn player in opera orchestras, accompanying AT lessons. 1990-93 trained as an Alexander Technique teacher in Freiburg. Since then, she has worked as a freelance horn player with concerts and CD recordings worldwide, as well as a teacher in the Alexander Technique. Lecturer for natural horn at the Würzburg University of Music (formerly also in Leipzig and Freiburg). Since 2012, head of advanced training courses on AT, breathing and music, as well as temporary assistant at the AT School in Paris.
Zvi Meniker
The harpsichordist, organist and fortepiano player Zvi Meniker was born in Moscow and grew up in Israel. At the age of 15, he went to the Mozarteum University of Music in Salzburg, where he graduated with distinction, as well as at the Zurich Conservatory. His teachers were Alois Forer, Nikolaus Harnoncourt and Johann Sonnleitner, and later also the American fortepiano specialist Malcolm Bilson at Cornell University in the USA.
Highly valued for his versatility, Zvi Meniker has a repertoire on his three instruments that ranges from the works of the late Middle Ages to the 20th century. His virtuoso, lively and passionate playing style has been frequently praised in newspaper reports and reviews from many cities in Europe, the USA and Israel, and he has won prizes at international competitions.
His busy concert schedule takes him all over Europe, the United States and Israel, where he also teaches at master classes for early music in Jerusalem. He has released CD recordings with works by J.S. Bach, Beethoven and Chopin. The subject of his doctoral thesis (Cornell University, 2001) is the performance practice of the piano works of Fréderic Chopin.
Zvi Meniker has taught harpsichord and performance practice at Duke University in the USA and has been a long-time lecturer at the Academy of Early Music in Jerusalem. He was a lecturer at the "Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy" Academy in Leipzig.
