Tabea Zimmermann
Encyclopedia
Tabea Zimmermann, born on October 8, 1966 in Lahr
, (Germany
), is a German violist
.
She began learning to play the viola
at the age of three, and commenced piano
studies at age five. At the age of 13, she studied viola with Ulrich Koch at the Conservatory of Freiburg and progressed to study with Sándor Végh
at the Mozarteum http://www.moz.ac.at/english/index.shtml University of Salzburg
.
She soon gained notice in international competitions, winning first prizes in Genève (1982), Budapest
(1984), and the Maurice Vieux International Viola Competition
in Paris
(1983) for which she was awarded a superb instrument made by contemporary luthier Étienne Vatelot (1980) which she has played in her worldwide concert tours ever since.
As a soloist she has performed with numerous major orchestras, including the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra
, the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra
, the BBC Philharmonic
, the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande
, under the baton of noted conductors including Kurt Masur
, Bernard Haitink
, Christoph Eschenbach
, Nikolaus Harnoncourt
, and others.
Tabea Zimmermann is likewise actively involved in chamber music
, having performed with Gidon Kremer
(violin
), Heinz Holliger
(oboist
and composer
), Hartmut Höll (piano
), Steven Isserlis
(cello
), and Pamela Frank (violin) at numerous festivals. She has devoted a significant part of her chamber career to the Arcanto Quartet http://www.tabeazimmermann.com/english/arcanto.html, formed with violin
ists Antje Weithaas and Daniel Sepec and cellist Jean-Guihen Queyras
.
Highly committed to the 20th century repertoire
, she has attained noted success performing the “Sonata for Solo Viola” written for her by György Ligeti
, premiering in 1994. Other contemporary composers who have written works for her include Heinz Holliger
, Wolfgang Rihm
, Georges Lentz
, Bruno Mantovani
, Sally Beamish
and Josef Tal.
Since 2002, Tabea Zimmermann has been a professor of viola and chamber music at the Hanns Eisler Academy of Music
http://www.hfm-berlin.de/ in Berlin
. Previously she was on the faculty of the Saarbrücken
Music Academy (1987-1989) and the Frankfurt University of Music and Performing Arts
(1994-2002). Her artistic achievements and contributions have garnered her numerous national and international awards, including the Frankfurt Music Prize, the Hesse
(State) Cultural Prize, and the International Prize of the Chigiana Music Academy of Sienna
.
She is the widow of conductor David Shallon (1950-2000), and is recently married to American conductor Steven Sloane
. The couple have three children: Yuval and Jonathan (Shallon’s sons), and daughter Maya (born in 2003).
Lahr
Lahr is a city in western Baden-Württemberg, Germany, approximately 38 km north of Freiburg in Breisgau and 100 km south of Karlsruhe...
, (Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
), is a German violist
Violist
-Notable violists:A* Julia Rebekka Adler * Sir Hugh Allen , conductor* Kris Allen * Johann Andreas Amon * Paul Angerer , composer* Steven Ansell * Atar Arad * Cecil Aronowitz...
.
She began learning to play the viola
Viola
The viola is a bowed string instrument. It is the middle voice of the violin family, between the violin and the cello.- Form :The viola is similar in material and construction to the violin. A full-size viola's body is between and longer than the body of a full-size violin , with an average...
at the age of three, and commenced piano
Piano
The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
studies at age five. At the age of 13, she studied viola with Ulrich Koch at the Conservatory of Freiburg and progressed to study with Sándor Végh
Sándor Végh
Sándor Végh was a Hungarian, later French, violinist and conductor. He was best known as one of the great chamber music violinists of the twentieth century.- Education :...
at the Mozarteum http://www.moz.ac.at/english/index.shtml University of Salzburg
Salzburg
-Population development:In 1935, the population significantly increased when Salzburg absorbed adjacent municipalities. After World War II, numerous refugees found a new home in the city. New residential space was created for American soldiers of the postwar Occupation, and could be used for...
.
She soon gained notice in international competitions, winning first prizes in Genève (1982), Budapest
Budapest
Budapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter...
(1984), and the Maurice Vieux International Viola Competition
Maurice Vieux International Viola Competition
The Maurice Vieux International Viola Competition is an international music competition for viola players established in 1983 by the French viola society Les Amis de l'Alto...
in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
(1983) for which she was awarded a superb instrument made by contemporary luthier Étienne Vatelot (1980) which she has played in her worldwide concert tours ever since.
As a soloist she has performed with numerous major orchestras, including the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra
Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra
The Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra is one of the the oldest symphony orchestras in the world...
, the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra
Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra
The Berlin Philharmonic, German: , formerly Berliner Philharmonisches Orchester , is an orchestra based in Berlin, Germany. In 2006, a group of ten European media outlets voted the Berlin Philharmonic number three on a list of "top ten European Orchestras", after the Vienna Philharmonic and the...
, the BBC Philharmonic
BBC Philharmonic
The BBC Philharmonic is a British broadcasting symphony orchestra based at Media City UK, Salford, England. It is one of five radio orchestras maintained by the British Broadcasting Corporation. The orchestra's primary concert venue is the Bridgewater Hall....
, the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande
Orchestre de la Suisse Romande
The Orchestre de la Suisse Romande is a Swiss symphony orchestra, based in Geneva at the Victoria Hall...
, under the baton of noted conductors including Kurt Masur
Kurt Masur
Kurt Masur is a German conductor, particularly noted for his interpretation of German Romantic music.- Biography :Masur was born in Brieg, Lower Silesia, Germany and studied piano, composition and conducting in Leipzig, Saxony. Masur has been married three times...
, Bernard Haitink
Bernard Haitink
Bernard Johan Herman Haitink, CH, KBE is a Dutch conductor and violinist.- Early life :Haitink was born in Amsterdam, the son of Willem Haitink and Anna Haitink. He studied music at the conservatoire in Amsterdam...
, Christoph Eschenbach
Christoph Eschenbach
Christoph Eschenbach , born February 20, 1940, Breslau, Germany is a German-born pianist and conductor. He currently holds positions in Washington, D.C. as music director of the National Symphony Orchestra and music director of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.-Early...
, Nikolaus Harnoncourt
Nikolaus Harnoncourt
Nikolaus Harnoncourt is an Austrian conductor, particularly known for his historically informed performances of music from the Classical era and earlier. Starting out as a classical cellist, he founded his own period instrument ensemble in the 1950s, and became a pioneer of the Early Music movement...
, and others.
Tabea Zimmermann is likewise actively involved in chamber music
Chamber music
Chamber music is a form of classical music, written for a small group of instruments which traditionally could be accommodated in a palace chamber. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small number of performers with one performer to a part...
, having performed with Gidon Kremer
Gidon Kremer
Gidon Kremer is a Latvian violinist and conductor. In 1980 he left the USSR and settled in Germany.-Biography:Kremer was born in Riga to parents of German-Jewish and Latvian-Swedish origins. He began playing the violin at the age of four, receiving instruction from his father and his grandfather,...
(violin
Violin
The violin is a string instrument, usually with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is the smallest, highest-pitched member of the violin family of string instruments, which includes the viola and cello....
), Heinz Holliger
Heinz Holliger
Heinz Holliger Heinz Holliger Heinz Holliger (born 21 May 1939 is a Swiss oboist, composer and conductor.-Biography:He was born in Langenthal, Switzerland, and began his musical education at the conservatories of Bern and Basel. He studied composition with Sándor Veress and Pierre Boulez...
(oboist
Oboe
The oboe is a double reed musical instrument of the woodwind family. In English, prior to 1770, the instrument was called "hautbois" , "hoboy", or "French hoboy". The spelling "oboe" was adopted into English ca...
and composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
), Hartmut Höll (piano
Piano
The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
), Steven Isserlis
Steven Isserlis
Steven Isserlis CBE is a British cellist. He is distinguished for his diverse repertoire, distinctive sound and total command of phrasing. He studied at Oberlin Conservatory of Music and was much influenced by the great iconoclast of Russian cello playing, Daniil Shafran...
(cello
Cello
The cello is a bowed string instrument with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is a member of the violin family of musical instruments, which also includes the violin, viola, and double bass. Old forms of the instrument in the Baroque era are baryton and viol .A person who plays a cello is...
), and Pamela Frank (violin) at numerous festivals. She has devoted a significant part of her chamber career to the Arcanto Quartet http://www.tabeazimmermann.com/english/arcanto.html, formed with violin
Violin
The violin is a string instrument, usually with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is the smallest, highest-pitched member of the violin family of string instruments, which includes the viola and cello....
ists Antje Weithaas and Daniel Sepec and cellist Jean-Guihen Queyras
Jean-Guihen Queyras
Jean-Guihen Queyras is a French cellist. He was born in Canada and moved with his parents to Algeria when he was 5 years old; the family moved to France 3 years later. He is a professor at the Musikhochschule Stuttgart and artistic co-director of the Rencontres Musicales de Haute-Provence...
.
Highly committed to the 20th century repertoire
20th century classical music
20th century classical music was without a dominant style and highly diverse.-Introduction:At the turn of the century, music was characteristically late Romantic in style. Composers such as Gustav Mahler and Jean Sibelius were pushing the bounds of Post-Romantic Symphonic writing...
, she has attained noted success performing the “Sonata for Solo Viola” written for her by György Ligeti
György Ligeti
György Sándor Ligeti was a composer of contemporary classical music. Born in a Hungarian Jewish family in Transylvania, Romania, he briefly lived in Hungary before becoming an Austrian citizen.-Early life:...
, premiering in 1994. Other contemporary composers who have written works for her include Heinz Holliger
Heinz Holliger
Heinz Holliger Heinz Holliger Heinz Holliger (born 21 May 1939 is a Swiss oboist, composer and conductor.-Biography:He was born in Langenthal, Switzerland, and began his musical education at the conservatories of Bern and Basel. He studied composition with Sándor Veress and Pierre Boulez...
, Wolfgang Rihm
Wolfgang Rihm
Wolfgang Rihm is a German composer.Rihm is Head of the Institute of Modern Music at the Karlsruhe Conservatory of Music and has been composer in residence at the Lucerne Festival and the Salzburg Festival...
, Georges Lentz
Georges Lentz
Georges Lentz is a contemporary composer and sound artist, born in Luxembourg in 1965, and is that country's internationally best known composer. Since 1990, he has been living in Sydney, Australia...
, Bruno Mantovani
Bruno Mantovani
Bruno Mantovani is a French composer. He has been awarded first prizes from the Paris Conservatory which he joined in 1993...
, Sally Beamish
Sally Beamish
Sally Beamish is a British composer of chamber, vocal, choral and orchestral music. She has also worked in the field of music theatre, film and television, as well as composing for children and for her local community....
and Josef Tal.
Since 2002, Tabea Zimmermann has been a professor of viola and chamber music at the Hanns Eisler Academy of Music
Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler
The " in Berlin, Germany is one of the leading music conservatories in Europe. It was established in East Berlin in 1950 as the ' because the older was in West Berlin...
http://www.hfm-berlin.de/ in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
. Previously she was on the faculty of the Saarbrücken
Saarbrücken
Saarbrücken is the capital of the state of Saarland in Germany. The city is situated at the heart of a metropolitan area that borders on the west on Dillingen and to the north-east on Neunkirchen, where most of the people of the Saarland live....
Music Academy (1987-1989) and the Frankfurt University of Music and Performing Arts
Frankfurt University of Music and Performing Arts
The Frankfurt University of Music and Performing Arts is a state Hochschule for Music, Theater and Dance in Frankfurt and is the only one of its kind in the Federal State of Hesse. It was founded in 1938....
(1994-2002). Her artistic achievements and contributions have garnered her numerous national and international awards, including the Frankfurt Music Prize, the Hesse
Hesse
Hesse or Hessia is both a cultural region of Germany and the name of an individual German state.* The cultural region of Hesse includes both the State of Hesse and the area known as Rhenish Hesse in the neighbouring Rhineland-Palatinate state...
(State) Cultural Prize, and the International Prize of the Chigiana Music Academy of Sienna
Sienna
Sienna is a form of limonite clay most famous in the production of oil paint pigments. Its yellow-brown colour comes from ferric oxides contained within...
.
She is the widow of conductor David Shallon (1950-2000), and is recently married to American conductor Steven Sloane
Steven Sloane
Steven Sloane is an American-born conductor based in Germany.He has been musical director of the Symphony Orchestra in Bochum since 1994. He is also musical director of the Stavanger Symphony Orchestra in Stavanger, Norway, a post he has held since 2007.In August 1999, Sloane was appointed Music...
. The couple have three children: Yuval and Jonathan (Shallon’s sons), and daughter Maya (born in 2003).