YANNI.com

INSPIRATO - The Masterpiece Album from Yanni : http://smarturl.it/yanni-inspirato

It took 4 years to complete the album, 30 years to write the music that inspired it.

YANNI’s greatest music performed by the world’s most extraordinary voices: 
Plácido Domingo, Renée Fleming, Rolando Villazón, Katherine Jenkins, Vittorio Grigólo, 
Russell Watson, Micaëla Oeste, Nathan Pacheco, Chloe Lowery, Lauren Jelencovich, 
Plácido Domingo Jr., and Pretty Yende



International singing superstar Sarah Brightman is the world’s biggest-selling soprano. She pioneered the classical crossover movement and is famed for her vocal range of over three octaves. Sarah is the only artist to have simultaneously topped the Billboard dance and classical charts. Her voice has rung out from theatres, arenas, cathedrals, world heritage centres and Olympic stadiums, bringing to life some of the world’s most beautiful music.

Sarah’s work transcends any single genre, synthesizing many influences into a unique sound and vision. She remains among the world’s most prominent performers, with global sales of 30 million units and over 180 gold and platinum awards in more than 40 countries.

Brightman returned to the studio in 2016 to work on her album HYMN with long-time producer Frank Peterson. Released on November 9, 2018, it debuted at #1 on the Classical and Classical Crossover Billboard charts. Sarah continues to tour globally, most recently performing her acclaimed A Starlight Symphony in Japan and Taiwan to rave reviews, and will round off 2025 with her A Winter Symphony tour in Canada and the USA.

During his studies under Paul Kuen and Raimund Grumbach, German baritone Christian Gerhaher also attended the Opera School of the Academy of Music in Munich, and together with his regular piano partner Gerold Huber studied lied interpretation with Friedemann Berger. While completing his medical studies Christian Gerhaher perfected his vocal training in master-classes given by Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf and Inge Borkh. In the meantime Christian Gerhaher is himself an enthusiastic teacher and gives master-classes at Aldeburgh Festival, Yale University, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, at the Schwetzingen Festival, and in his position as honorary professor he holds workshops at the Academy of Music in Munich.

Christian Gerhaher’s exemplary lied interpretations with Gerold Huber set standards, and their recordings have been highly acclaimed. Their Schubert album Abendbilder received the Gramophone Award in 2006. In the same year Christian Gerhaher was honoured with the NDR Musikpreis at the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival. 2009 he was granted the renowned German Rheingau Musikpreis and for his Schumann recording Melancholy he not only received the BBC Music Award but also the "Echo Klassik" in the category Singer of the Year followed 2010 by the MIDEM Classical Award as Singer of the Year as well as the Dutch Edison Klassiek for his recent Mahler album.

The lied duo can be heard on the stages of major international recital centres, for instance at the Wigmore Hall in London, the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, the Cologne and Berlin Philharmonie, the Konzerthaus and Musikverein in Vienna. Christian Gerhaher is a regular guest at Schwetzingen Festival, Rheingau Musik Festival, Vienna Festival, Klangbogen Festival, the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, the London Proms, the Edinburgh and Lucerne Festivals, as well as the Aspen and Tanglewood Festivals in the USA.

The lied recitals of the current seasons are mostly dedicated to Gustav Mahler. Performances will take them to London, Amsterdam, Cologne, Madrid, Munich, Venice, Torino, Rome and they will also return to Rheingau Musik Festival.
Besides his activity giving concerts and recitals, Christian Gerhaher also performs in select opera productions, for instance, he has a close association with the Frankfurt Opera House. Under Riccardo Muti he was Papageno in a production of The Magic Flute at the Salzburg Festival in 2006 (issued by Decca as a DVD). Gerhaher has been given guest performances in the title role in Henze’s Prinz von Homburg at the Theater an der Wien, as Wolfram at the Teatro Real Madrid, at the Vienna State Opera and Munich State Opera, and at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden in London. He started the 2010/2011 season as the Count in Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro in Munich. In future he is scheduled to sing the role of Eisenstein and Pelléas, both in Frankfurt, and Posa in Don Carlos in Toulouse. The recipient of countless awards for his lieder singing is  likewise recognized for his operatic work and was consequently elected by the magazine "Opernwelt" as "Best Singer of the Year 2010" for his portrayals of Prinz von Homburg and Wolfram in Vienna und Munich.

Christian Gerhaher has performed together with conductors such as Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Herbert Blomstedt, Heinz Holliger, Simon Rattle, Kent Nagano, Mariss Jansons, Bernard Haitink and Christian Thielemann in the world’s major concert halls. The music of Gustav Mahler brought him together with Riccardo Chailly (Wunderhornlieder with the Leipzig Gewandhausorchester), Daniel Harding (Das Lied von der Erde with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra), Gustavo Dudamel (Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen at La Scala Milan) and Pierre Boulez (Wunderhornlieder/Cleveland Orchestra). Other major orchestras which regularly invite Christian Gerhaher to perform include Concentus Musicus Wien, Berlin, Munich and Vienna Philharmonic, and Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra. He also gives concerts with major orchestras outside Europe, including NHK Symphony Orchestra, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra and Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
Since the beginning of his recording activity Christian Gerhaher’s CDs have been issued by Sony Music, with which he has an exclusive partnership (exceptions are stated in brackets). With his accompanist Gerold Huber, Schumann cycles, all the Schubert cycles as well as many other lied recordings have been issued, such as for example Terezín Theresienstadt with Anne Sofie von Otter (Deutsche Grammophon). Furthermore, Christian Gerhaher can be heard on CDs singing in orchestral works: Mendelssohn’s Elias with the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig conducted by Herbert Blomstedt, twice Orff’s Carmina burana with the Berlin Philharmonic and Simon Rattle (EMI) and NEW with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and Chorus conducted by Daniel Harding for Deutsche Grammophon, Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde (The Song of the Earth) with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra conducted by Kent Nagano and Wunderhornlieder (Cleveland Orchestra/Magdalena Kožená/Pierre Boulez). With Nikolaus Harnoncourt Christian Gerhaher has made recordings of Joseph Haydn’s two oratorios The Creation and The Seasons, Bach’s Christmas Oratorio, Schumann’s Das Paradies und die Peri and also the recording of the live concert performance of the Faust Scenes with the Concertgebouw Orchestra, on the orchestra’s own label RCO Live. End of 2009 the latest solo CD with Gerold Huber has been issued, a recording of songs by Gustav Mahler. 2011 Wolf´s Italian Songbook was released, together with Mojca Erdmann and Gerold Huber. 

Christian Gerhaher lives with his wife and their three children in Munich.



He inspires millions with his open-hearted, emotive playing, whether it be in intimate recitals or on the grandest of stages – such as the 2014 World Cup concert in Rio, with Placido Domingo, to celebrate the final game; the 56th GRAMMY Award, where he performed with Metallica; the Opening Ceremony of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, where more than four billion people around the world viewed his performance; the Last Night of the Proms at London’s Royal Albert Hall, or the Liszt 200th birthday concert with the Philadelphia Orchestra and Charles Dutoit which was broadcast live in more than 300 movie theaters around the United States and 200 cinemas across Europe (the first classical music cinemacast to be headlined by a solo artist). He forms enduring musical partnerships with the world’s greatest artists, from conductors such as Daniel Barenboim, Gustavo Dudamel and Sir Simon Rattle, to artists from outside of classical music – among them dubstep dancer Marquese “nonstop” Scott, king of the crooners Julio Inglesias and jazz titan Herbie Hancock. He even builds relationships with corporations who will help him get classical music to ever-more people - thanks to his Sony ambassadorship, for instance, he brought Prokofiev’s 7th Piano Sonata to the soundtrack of the multi-million- selling computer game Gran Turismo 5and 6! And he builds cultural bridges between East and West, frequently introducing Chinese music to Western audiences, and vice versa.

Yet he never forgets what first inspired, and continues to inspire him. Great artists, above all the great composers – Liszt, Chopin and the others – whose music he now delights in bringing to others. Even that famous old Tom and Jerry cartoon “The Cat Concerto” which introduced him, as a delighted child, to the music of Liszt – and that childlike excitement at the discovery of music now surely stays with him and propels him to what he calls “his second career”, bringing music into the lives of children around the world, both through his work for the United Nations and through his own Lang Lang International Music Foundation. As he inspires, he is inspired. As he is inspired, he inspires others. It is this quality, perhaps, that led the New Yorker to call him “the world’s ambassador of the keyboard”.

It takes a special kind of dedication to come from a small Chinese town Shenyang , to travel to the big city as a small child and to win the attention of the country’s finest music professors. And then to leave behind your home country altogether to join the world-famous Curtis Institute of Music Philadelphia, USA. Lang Lang achieved all of these early on – he started playing piano aged three, won the Shenyang Competition and gave his first public recital by the time he was five, entered Beijing’s Central Music Conservatory aged nine, won first prize at the Tchaikovsky International Young Musicians’ Competition and playing the complete Chopin Etudes at the Beijing Concert Hall at 13. He left for America, Curtis and the great piano teacher Gary Graffman and when his moment came, he was ready. That moment happened when, aged 17, he was called upon to make a dramatic last-minute substitution for the famous Andre Watts to perform in the “Gala Of The Century”, playing a Tchaikovsky concerto with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. It made him what journalists like to call an “overnight star” and the world’s finest concert halls quickly beckoned.

Today, his resume reads like a bestseller (and indeed his biography, Journey of a Thousand Miles, has been published by Random House in eleven languages, and was released to critical acclaim – and as part of his commitment to the education of children, he released a version specifically for younger readers, entitled Playing with Flying Keys). He has been heralded as the “hottest artist on the classical music planet” by the New York Times, has played sold out concerts in every major city in the world and is the first Chinese pianist to be engaged by the Vienna Philharmonic, Berlin Philharmonic and the New York Philharmonic orchestras.

Time Magazine has recently included Lang Lang in the “Time 100”, the magazine’s annual list of the 100 Most Influential People in the World, naming him as a symbol of the youth of China, and its future. Lang Lang is the cultural ambassador of the cities of Shenzhen and Shenyang. In July 2012 he relayed the London Olympic torch in London just before the opening of the XXX Olympiad.

And if the Chinese passion for piano isn’t solely due to him, he has played no small part as a role model to encourage more than 40 million Chinese children to learn to play the instrument – a phenomenon coined by The Today Show as "the Lang Lang effect." Steinway Pianos, for the first time in their century-and-a-half-long history, named a piano model after a single artist when they introduced “The Lang Lang Piano” to China. That piano, specially designed for early music education, is now on its fifth iteration.

And the child Lang Lang was and who, perhaps, is always with him, would surely have approved of the way he gives back to children around the world. His volunteer activities include mentoring rising young talented pianists, convening 100 piano students at a time in concert, performing for sick children in hospi­tals, delivering classical music recitals in underserved and remote communities, and donating his musical talents to raise awareness of other charitable causes.  These charitable efforts have led to the launch of the Lang Lang International Music Foundation, with its goals of cultivating tomorrow’s top pianists, championing music education at the forefront of technology, and building a young audience through live music experiences. The Financial Times described Lang Lang as “evangelical in his efforts to spread the popularity of classical music.” And in May 2009, Lang Lang and three chosen young scholars from the foundation – aged between 6 and 10 years old – performed together on The Oprah Winfrey Show on "Oprah's Search for the World's Most Smartest and Most Talented Kids." 

In 2011,  Lang Lang Music World was launched, a multi-functioning arts complex located in Shenzhen and Chongqing, China, where children can go to receive piano education, participate in master classes and competitions, attend concerts and purchase educational products. Lang Lang himself continues to give master classes regularly throughout the world at the invitation of the most prestigious music institutions, including the Curtis Institute of Music, Juilliard School, Manhattan School of Music and Hanover Conservatory, as well as all the top conservatories in China where he holds honorary professorships. Elite universities such as Oxford, Harvard and Columbia have invited him to give talks.

Lang Lang enjoys reaching audiences of all sizes and few come bigger than that of the YouTube Symphony Orchestra, of which Lang Lang was the first official Ambassador – a role, created by YouTube and Google that combined two of his great loves, music and outreach through technology. More traditionally, tens of thousands of people have enjoyed Lang Lang’s performances in open-air concerts in parks and venues around the globe, including Central Park in New York City, Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, Ravinia Festival in Chicago, Theaterplatz in Dresden and Derby Park in Hamburg. Lang Lang participated in the opening concert at Munich's Olympic Stadium with Mariss Jansons, marking the commencement of the World Cup Games. In celebratory concerts for the closing of 2008 Euro Cup finals, Lang Lang played with the Vienna Philharmonic under the baton of Zubin Mehta in front of Schönbrunn Palace. And he marked the New Year’s Eve gala opening of the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Beijing with another great conductor, Seiji Ozawa.

In December 2007, Lang Lang was guest soloist at the Nobel Prize concert in Stockholm, an event attended by Nobel Laureates and members of the Royal Family. He performed as soloist in Oslo for the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize award ceremony and concert for President Barack Obama.

Lang Lang has made numerous TV appearances, including The Today Show, the Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Good Morning America, CBS Early Show, 60 Minutes, Wetten Dass and El Número Uno among many others. He has been featured on every major TV network and in news and lifestyle magazines worldwide, including such diverse publications as The New Yorker, Esquire, Vogue, The Times, Financial Times, GQ, Cosmopolitan, Die Welt, Reader’s Digest and People.

As well as President Obama, Lang Lang has performed for numerous international dignitaries including the former Secretary-General of the United Nations Kofi Annan, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, George H. W. Bush, George W. Bush, William J. Clinton, Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, former President Hu Jin-Tao of China, President Horst Koehler of Germany, H.R.H. Prince Charles, former French President Nicolas Sarkozy, President Francois Hollande, Queen Beatrix and King Majesty King Willem-Alexander and Poland President Lech Kaczynski. Of many landmark events, he was honored to perform recently for President Barack Obama and former President Hu Jin-Tao at the White House State Dinner, as well as at the Diamond Jubilee celebratory concert for Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace.

Wherever he can, Lang Lang tries to give back. In 2013, he was designated by the Secretary General of the United Nations as a Messenger of Peace focusing on global education. Lang Lang has contributed and worked to raise funds and awareness for earthquake relief efforts in China and Haiti. These efforts included auctioning the red Steinway piano played during his 2008 New York Central Park concert, donating the net proceeds to the American Red Cross China Earthquake fund, and organizing a benefit concert at Carnegie Hall, donating the net proceeds to UNICEF’s Earthquake Relief Fund in Haiti. He also currently serves on the Weill Music Institute Advisory Committee as part of Carnegie Hall’s educational program and is the youngest member of Carnegie Hall’s Artistic Advisory Board.

Honors include being added as one of the 250 Young Global Leaders picked by the World Economic Forum and receiving the 2010 Crystal Award in Davos. In May 2011, Lang Lang received an Honorary Doctorate of Music from His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales at the Royal College of Music, and received his second Honorary Doctorate in Musical Arts at the Manhattan School of Music in May 2012. In December 2011, he was honored the highest prize awarded by the Ministry of Culture of the People’s Republic of China. More recently, he has received the highest German civilian honor, the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany, in recognition of his distinguished services to music and, in January 2013, he was presented with the Medal of the Order of Arts and Letters, by the French Minister of Culture.

He is one of the world’s most prolific and highest-profile recording artists. Featured soloist on the Golden Globe® winning score for the film The Painted Veil, composed by Alexandre Desplat, he can also be heard on the soundtracks of The Banquet, composed by Tan Dun, and of My Week With Marilyn. All of his albums have entered the top classical charts as well as many pop charts around the globe. His album of the First and Fourth Beethoven Piano concertos with L’Orchestre de Paris and Maestro Christoph Eschenbach debuted at number one on the Classical Billboard Chart. Lang Lang also appeared on Billboard’s New Artist chart at the highest-ever position for a classical artist. In 2007, he was nominated for a Grammy® Award, becoming the first Chinese artist to be nominated for Best Instrumental Soloist. He has recently recorded the movie soundtrack for the Japanese blockbuster film Nodame Cantabile, Chopin’s 24 Etudes for “Project Chopin” (the largest project in honor of Chopin’s bicentenary) ,“Nuit De Mai” with Placido Domingo and, of course, that opening sequence for Gran Turismo, the most successful videogame to date.

In February 2010, Lang Lang joined Sony Music Entertainment as an exclusive recording artist; his first album with Sony featured a live recording of his 2010 recital at Vienna’s legendary Musikverein (including a segment filmed in 3D). His next CD, “Liszt, My Piano Hero” and DVD “Liszt, Now!” celebrated the 200th Anniversary of the great composer, while 2012 saw the release of “The Chopin Album”. His latest album is a recording with Nikolaus Harnoncourt and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra of all masterpieces of Wolfgang A. Mozart and will be released October 2014.

I was born in Belfast in 1967. My interest in music was awakened when I was 7 years old, during a holiday when my parents and I (I have no siblings) stayed in a guesthouse near Dublin, run by a family of musicians, which included the composer John Dunn. Inspired by the wonderful flute playing of the teenage daughter, I immediately began learning the recorder, with the help of my father. My father was not a musician, but he was the kind of natural student who could turn his hand to learning almost anything, and together we both learned to play the recorder from tutor books at home. I never looked back. I was completely smitten by music. When I was about 9 years old a wind quintet visited my primary school to give us a concert. This was an extremely rare treat. What was that gorgeous long, black instrument with the bell and silver keys which oozed forth the most heavenly, rich, oily sounds I’d ever heard? I was so entranced by it that I cannot remember the other four instruments in the group. Ah, the clarinet! Thus, I then plagued my poor parents incessantly for a clarinet. But, being the shrewd people that they are, they made me prove it was no fad by insisting I study recorder for another year first. This I gladly did, and then they kept their promise and bought me a clarinet. I was so happy I felt giddy!
All through my teens I worked as hard as possible, studying the clarinet and piano at the Belfast School of Music, and completing all the usual grade exams. I even loved scales! Yes, I found it a great releasing of tension after a hideous day at school to take my frustrations out on the poor scales by whizzing up and down them as loud and fast as was sanely possible. My poor parents – they were saints to tolerate the racket without complaint!
Now, during all these early years my head was constantly filling up with music that I knew was not anyone else’s. All I was aware of was an enormous, urgent, internal drive to get it down on paper. And fast! I did not even know at this tender age that this was in fact the beginnings of composition. Composers, to me back then, were long dead geniuses like Beethoven and Mozart. I actually didn’t care what it was called; I just got to work, writing many little piano pieces and hundreds of single line melodies that just kept flying into my head every day, demanding to be instantly written down. It filled me with wild energy and excitement every time I was at work on a piece (no matter how small or insignificant) and it quickly became an addiction. Every time something happened to me, whether exciting, upsetting or just ordinary, everyday events I had to write, at the very least, a tune to express it. I still do this now. With the constant listening to the great works of Richard Strauss, Mahler, Beethoven and Haydn, this drive soon became one to write orchestral music. Now there’s a hefty challenge for you, I thought, how the heck do I write all this mish-mash down? I spent years (and still do) hungrily studying the orchestral scores of the great masters, learning how orchestral sounds were translated into written music. It is a lifelong journey which never ends, I can tell you!
So, when I was nineteen I finally made it into the London College of Music – a dream-come-true. There I spent 3 years on the GLCM degree course, specializing in clarinet with David Campbell and piano with Renalda Mackie. At this stage composition was still the hidden light under the bushel. I was shy about it and found it rather difficult to talk much about it back then. However, despite the piano and clarinet being very much dominant, the urge to write would not remain suppressed and it began to seep out. I just kept on quietly writing in my non-existent spare time and was lucky enough at college to have a few orchestral pieces tried out by the college orchestra. While they were not played to performance standard, it was enough to help me realize that I must pursue this further. My harmony tutor, Michael Regan, and John McCabe, the college director, both gave me great help and encouragement in orchestration, which I am still grateful for to this day. So, my post graduate year was spent on a wonderful Diploma course in writing film music, under Francis Shaw. I adored this course and learned a huge amount. It was invaluable having unique opportunities to have my music expertly played and recorded. It was thrilling beyond belief, and after it there was no stopping me.
Throughout the 1990s, when I left college, I wrote constantly and was lucky enough to have very good musician friends who played and recorded much of the music. I received some commissions also and worked on these with excitement and relish. I also taught clarinet and piano at Ibstock Place School in Roehampton and this was a wonderful position which lent me marvellous opportunities to orchestrate and arrange music for the school band, orchestra and choir. I also met many great people there, a few of whom I’m still friends with today. I enjoyed years of exciting freelance clarinet playing in a wide range of events from shows, weddings, chamber music and orchestral concerts, some of it extending as far as Birmingham.
But sometimes life takes unusual turns. In July 1996 I went to work as a brewer of beer with The Firkin Brewery! Looking back now, I realise that in some bizarre and twisted way, my music needed me to make this change in order for it to actually grow and mature. I didn’t know that back then though, and it really did feel a very odd thing to do. But I went with my instincts, and ended up loving the new job. And indeed, I met Bob, who would one day become my husband! Bob played fantastic folk guitar. Bingo! Out came my penny whistle and, together with the fine, good ale we brewed, we embarked on a fabulous life of Traditional Irish Folk Music. This led us to meet many folk musicians and for years we played in pub sessions, concerts and ceilidhs all over the UK and Ireland. Needless to say I wrote folk tunes nineteen to the dozen, which we played along with the usual traditional session music.
In 2000, after sadly being made redundant from the Firkin Brewery we moved to Manchester where we soon got married and started our family. Bob retrained into IT and is now a highly skilled Network Manager. We had 2 beautiful children, Megan (now 11) and Edward (called after Edward Elgar and now 9). I stayed at home with them until they started school, while at the same time still practising and continuing to write music, both classical and folk. And that takes us up to where I am now. With Megan and Edward now both at school,  I’m  back into the music life again for real. I currently play clarinet/Bass clarinet/Eflat clarinet with the Bolton Symphony Orchestra and cello with the Bolton Chamber Orchestra, and am also teaching part-time clarinet/piano/ whistle to both adults and children.  Fancy a good tune? Well, you’ve come to the right place – the kettle’s on!

Working with the greatest artists ever since the founding of Columbia Records in 1887.

Yo-Yo Ma, Glenn Gould, Il Volo, Jonas kaufmann, Igor Levit, Alexis Ffrench, Eugene Ormandy, Leonard Bernstein, Khatia Buniatishvili, Joshua Bell, Arthur Rubinstein, Murray Perahia, Bruno Walter, Teodor Currentzis, Vladimir Horowitz, Dirk Maassen, Christian Gerhaher, Leif Ove Andsnes, Arcadi Volodos, Lavinia Meijer...and many more!

#classical #neoclassical

Winner of the Queen Elisabeth (2009) and Yehudi Menuhin Competitions (2008), Ray Chen is among the most compelling young violinists today.   “Ray has proven himself to be a very pure musician with great qualities such as a beautiful youthful tone, vitality and lightness.   He has all the skills of a truly musical interpreter,” said the great Maxim Vengerov.
Ray has released two critically acclaimed albums on Sony: a recital program “Virtuoso” of works by Bach, Tartini, Franck, and Wieniawski, and the Mendelssohn and Tchaikovsky concertos with Swedish Radio Orchestra and Daniel Harding.   Following the success of these recordings, Ray was profiled by The Strad and Gramophone magazines as “the one to watch”.   “Virtuoso” was distinguished with the prestigious ECHO Klassik award.   He is currently working on his third, all-Mozart album with Christoph Eschenbach and the Schleswig-Holstein Festival Orchestra, slated for release later this year.
Ray continues to win the admiration of fans and fellow musicians worldwide.   In 2012, he became the youngest soloist ever to perform in the televised Nobel Prize Concert for the Nobel Laureates and the Swedish Royal Family.   His Carnegie Hall debut with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic and Sakari Oramo, as well as his sold-out Musikverein concert with the Gewandhaus Orchestra and Riccardo Chailly were met with standing ovations.   Since the 2012- 13 season, Ray has been invited to join Konzerthaus Dortmund's series “Junge Wilde,” which presents young and groundbreaking artists in Germany.   Later this season, Ray will make his San Francisco recital debut at the SF Jazz Center. He also looks forward to his upcoming recital tour of Australia and his debuts with the Orchestre National de France and the London Philharmonic Orchestra.
Followed by over 500,000 people on SoundCloud, Ray Chen looks to expand the classical music audience by increasing its appeal to the young generation via all available social media platforms.   He is the first ever classical musician to be invited to write a regular blog about his life as a touring soloist for the largest Italian publishing house, RCS Rizzoli (Corriere della Sera, Gazzetta dello Sport, Max).   In his unstinting efforts to break down barriers between classical music, fashion and pop culture, he is supported by Giorgio Armani and was recently featured in Vogue magazine.
Born in Taiwan and raised in Australia, Ray was accepted to the Curtis Institute of Music at age 15, where he studied with Aaron Rosand and was supported by Young Concert Artists.   He plays the 1702 "Lord Newlands" Stradivarius violin on loan from the Nippon Music Foundation.

No one could have imagined at that time what to expect - like Xavier de Maistre himself, when he decided to change the face of the harp 16 years ago. Today he plays pieces like "Moldau" by Smetana in breathtaking precision and presents masterful pieces of music that are usually played by an entire orchestra.

Meanwhile, a worldwide audience listens to his virtuosity and enjoys the unprecedented sounds. Pieces, that no harpist played before, or even thought about - like the Haydn piano concertos. Not only that makes him one of the most extraordinary musicians, even masters of this time.

Xavier de Maistre began to study harp with 9 years. Like many other famous musicians, all started with love - but in this case not as expected the love to his harp. It was rather the love for his former teacher, who offered extra harp lessons. Early, it turned out that Xavier has a great talent and no wonder he started with 25 years to play for the Vienna Philharmonic. Before that he played 3 years for the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and in 1998 Xavier won the first prize of the "USA International Harp Competition“, the major harp competitions in the world. But since Xavier´s family is not from a traditional harp-playing dynasty they put great importance to a solid education. So Xavier started his study of politics at the „Institut des Sciences Politiques“ in Paris and spent 1 year in London at the „London School of Economics ", when he finally decided to prefer music to the political studies. For a musician, he achieved very early what all harpists dream of – a position in one of the best orchestras in the world, the Vienna Philharmonic.

However Xavier de Maistre was about to go on. To see this point as the highlight of the career, which would definitely be a great honor for most of the harpists, and aslo for Xavier, but it was also a kind of sad moment. He achieved the ultimate goal of a harpist at age 25. Through his countless appearances and his keen ambition he has always wants to refute the long-existing bias of the harp - played in the background by angel-like women. Thanks to his his quick anticipation, intelligence and tremendous skill, he has played many pieces as a soloist with the harp and delighted thousands of listeners. Finally, he succeeds to establish the harp as an independent instrument. During his career, many great conductors such as Riccardo Muti, Sir Simon Rattle, Sir Andre Previn, and Daniele Gatti became curious on him and his passion and asked him to play with them. A long series of concerts follows, convincing the audience that Xavier de Maistre is undoubtedly the master of his instrument. Not for nothing, beside famous conductors, also the most successful singers like Barbara Bonney, Kathleen Battle and Diana Damrau played with him. Likewise, of course, the long list of world-renowned opera houses which he had already visited: Theatre des Champs Elysees Paris, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Musikverein Vienna, Tokyo Opera City, Lincoln Center New York, Salzburg Festival, La Scala Milan and many others.

No wonder, Xavier´s enthusiasm and his gift to play will not put an end to this success story. Awarded with the Echo Klassik Award 2009 for his album "Nuit d'Etoiles" as "Instrumentalist of the Year" (Sony Music) he reaps the fruits of his labor.

For more than 9 years Xavier de Maistre is working as a professor at the Musikhochschule Hamburg and now also teaches at the Julliard School in New York, at the Toho University in Tokyo and in London at Trinity College. After 11 years with the Vienna Philharmonic Xavier leaves his position in order to devote himself to his international solo career - a step that no harpist has done before.

Gary Woolf 1 is following