Gerhard Schulz

The Pharos Arts Foundation with the support of the Embassy of Austria in Nicosia, presents a concert with one of Austria’s most celebrated musicians – violinist Gerhard Schulz, member of the world renowned Alban Berg Quartet, for over 30 years, and founder of the Waldstein Ensemble. For his concert in Nicosia, on Friday 6 March 2015 at The Shoe Factory, he will join forces with pianist Noam Greenberg and cellist Lilia Schulz-Bayrova for an all-Viennese programme of works by Schubert, Brahms and Alban Berg.

GERHARD SCHULZ violin

Gerhard Schulz was born in Linz / Austria, in 1951, into a family of musicians. He studied with Franz Samohyl in Vienna, Sandor Vegh in Düsseldorf, and Shmuel Ashkenasi in the USA. He was a founding member of the Salzburg String Trio, the Schulz Ensemble, and the first violinist of the Düsseldorf String Quartet.

He was a member of the world renowned Alban Berg Quartet, for over 30 years, with regular appearances in the world’s most important concert venues. The Quartet had an exclusive contract with EMI Records released a great number of award-winning albums. Since 1980, Schulz has been professor for violin at the University for Music in Vienna, and since 1993, guest professor for chamber music at the Hochschule für Music in Cologne, Germany. After the Alban Berg Quartet’s final concert in 2008, Gerhard Schulz founded the Waldstein Ensemble (a piano quartet) and he now enjoys a busy life as a performer as well as an educator. In 2009, Gerhard Schulz made his debut as a conductor with the Copenhagen Philharmonic Orchestra.

NOAM GREENBERG piano

Noam Greenberg studied at the Rubin Academy in Tel Aviv and at Yale University, before moving to London to study with Maria Curcio. His life was changed by his visit to the International Musicians’ Seminar Prussia Cove in 2001, for master-classes with Ferenc Rados and András Schiff. Many lessons with Ferenc Rados followed in Budapest, and regular visits to the Open Chamber Music Seminars at IMS Prussia Cove including their 2004 UK national tour.

Noam Greenberg now enjoys a busy concert schedule as soloist, recitalist and chamber musician in both the traditional repertoire and new music and appears regularly on many European stages including the Wigmore Hall in London, the Vienna Konzerthaus, the Vienna Musikverein, the Berlin Konzerthaus, the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, Parco della Musica Roma and the Auditorio Nacional Madrid. An avid performer of contemporary music, he has given many Israeli premieres including Ligeti’s Piano Concerto, in a performance broadcast live by the European Broadcasting Union, and more recently the UK premiere of Magnus Lindberg’s Acequia Madre, broadcast by the BBC.

Greenberg has given many master-class courses, in the Royal Northern College of Music, the Britten Pearse School at Aldeburgh, and the Orlando Festival (Holland), to name but a few, and he has participated in numerous festivals, such as Lucerne, Aldeburgh, Stage-Barcelona, Cheltenham and IMS Prussia Cove. He is also an enthusiastic chamber music player and has collaborated with many artists including Chen Halevi, Anssi Kartunnen, Pekka Kuusisto, Adrian Brendel and Christine Schäffer. He is a member of the Waldstein Ensemble and the founder and Artistic Director of the Music at Tresanton festival, which takes place in Cornwall UK.

LILIA SCHULZ-BAYROVA cello

Lilia Schulz-Bayrova was born in 1971 in Sofia. At the age of six, she started taking cello lessons with her father, and won the National Cello Competition in Bulgaria in 1982 and 1983. At the age of 12, she made her first recording with the Bulgarian Radio Symphony Orchestra. After moving to Vienna, Lilia continued her studies with her father, Jontscho Bayrov, at the Vienna Conservatory. She graduated in 1989 with distinction, and in the same year, she won the National Competition in Austria, the International Cello Competition of the European Union, and she became the first woman to win the Special Prize of the Vienna Philharmonic. She completed her artistic training with Boris Pergamenschikow in Cologne, Heinrich Schiff in Salzburg, and Valentin Erben in Vienna, from where she graduated in 1997 with distinction. Lilia Schulz-Bayrova appeared as a soloist with many internationally renowned orchestras in Europe and the USA. In addition, she is highly in demand as a chamber musician, and since 1999, she is a professor at the Vienna Conservatory.

THE PROGRAMME:

Schubert – Violin Sonata No.3 in G minor, D.408
Brahms – Two Rhapsodies, Op.79
Berg – Piano Sonata, Op.1
Interval
Schubert – Piano Trio in E-flat major, D.929

Schubert’s G Minor sonatina, D.408 is actually one of his first three violin sonatas, written in early 1816 when he was 19. The three works weren’t published until 1836, eight years after Schubert’s death, when Anton Diabelli, who had purchased a large part of Schubert’s musical estate from Schubert’s brother Ferdinand, issued them as Sonatinas – their true identity remaining unknown for many years. Brahms composed the two Rhapsodies of Op.79 in 1879, at a time when he was at the height of his creativity. He dedicated them to Elizabet von Herzogenberg, one of his piano students and secret loves, whose husband, a minor composer and conductor, was also one of his close friends and admirers. It was Elizabet who suggested the title “Rhapsodies,” which the composer reluctantly accepted. “Among the most auspicious Opus Ones ever written,” was Glenn Gould’s assessment of Alban Berg’s Op.1 piano sonata. Berg wrote this work in 1907-08 while studying with Schönberg. Originally it was intended to have three movements but, after completing the first, Berg found that for a long time nothing worthwhile occurred to him, whereupon Schoenberg remarked, “In that case, you have said everything there was to be said.” Schubert’s Trio No.2 in E-flat major, D.929 was the second of the composer’s two full-length piano trios. Its composition began during November 1827 and it was probably finished within the next few weeks. The composer held a private performance of the piece in celebration of the forthcoming marriage of his long-time friend Josef von Spaun. Schubert himself felt that the E-flat Trio to be the better of his earlier B-flat Trio.

Tickets:
€15 / €10 Concessions & members of the Pharos Arts Foundation,
Box Office: Directly from the Foundation’s website www.pharosartsfoundation.org/ or Tel. 96669003 (Monday - Friday 10:00am-3:00pm)