Roman Jabłoński

One of the most eminent Polish cellists and an esteemed teacher. He commenced his music eduation in Gdańsk with Roman Suchecki going on to study with Sergei Shirinsky at the Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Moscow and with Aldo Parisot at Yale University in the United States.

In 1972, he won the prestigious Dealey Memorial Award in Dallas, which prompted his subsequent glittering career. His name could be seen on the posters of all the major concert halls in the world such as Carnegie Hall, Wigmore Hall and Royal Festival Hall, where he performed with renowned orchestras directed by celebrated conductors.

Roman Jabłoński has made a plethora of recordings for albums, radio and television. His rich repertoire prominently features contemporary music with a number of composers having dedicated to him their own new works. He was the first musician in Poland to perform the Cello Concerto No. 2 by Krzysztof Penderecki and Grave by Witold Lutosławski. His favourite jury composition is the Cello Concerto by Lutosławski and although it was dedicated to Mstislav Rostropovich, Roman Jabłoński was the composer’s preferred performer.

There was a long-standing friendship between Roman Jabłoński and Witold Lutosławski, who cooperated for more than fifteen years. They performed together with the major orchestras of international renown, including the Berliner Philharmonie, New York Philharmonic Orchestra (in a concert commemorating the composer’s 70th birthday), Cleveland Orchestra and Royal Scottish National Orchestra, in addition to all the BBC orchestras. They worked on a number of recordings too, one of them being the Cello Concerto released by EMI. Their close relationship can be attested by a letter that Witold Lutosławski sent to Roman Jabłoński: Dear Roman – how can I thank you enough for all your beautiful performances of this work? And I still hope for more. Yours truly, Witold. Cleveland 3 March 1988.

In addition to his concert activities, Roman Jabłoński teaches at a number of music academies and offers guidance during masterclasses.

Mindaugas Bačkus

Soloist, recitalist and orchestra musician. His wide range of artistic interests is reflected in the repertoire he performs: cello music from Baroque to modern times as well as works making use of the instrument’s (electro-) acoustic and theatrical possibilities. His receptiveness to experimentation has given him a chance to work with a number of contemporary composers, jazz musicians, early music ensembles, theatres and dance groups.

He graduated from the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre with a bachelor of arts degree and continued his education with Ralph Kirshbaum and Karine Georgian at the Royal College of Music in Manchester, United Kingdom. He has perfected his skills at masterclasses in Germany, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and the United States with Anner Bylsma, Viola de Hoog, Tsojoshi Tsutsumi, David Geringas and many others.

He has been a member of the chamber orchestra Kremerata Baltica, Lithuanian State Symphony Orchestra, Chordos String Quartet and, until now, Disobedient Ensemble. He has appeared at numerous festivals in Lithuania, the United States, Germany, Austria, Sweden and Norway.

Bačkus is the founder of the International Cello Festival and Competition held in Klaipeda as well as the International Cello Academy. Looking for new forms of reaching out with cello music to a wider range of audience, he takes it away from the concert halls to less obvious, unexpected places. In recognition of his promotional campaigns, he has been awarded the title of “Master of Culture” by Klaipeda’s municipal authorities.

Andrzej Bauer

He was awarded the first prize of the ARD International Competition in Munich, was a winner of the International Competition „Prague Spring” and a recipient of the Prize of the European Parliament and European Council.

He completed his tertiary education in Łódź with Kazimierz Michalik and perfected his skills at masterclasses with André Navarra, Miloš Sádlo and Daniel Szafran. As a holder of the Witold Lutosławski scholarship, he completed two-year studies in London with William Pleeth.

He has appeared with recitals in such places as Amsterdam, Paris, Vienna, Hamburg and Munich, and performed with such orchestras as the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra, RAI Alessandro Scarlatti Chamber Orchestra of Naples, Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra and Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra. As a soloist, he has been accompanied by most of the Polish symphony and chamber orchestras, and has been invited to join the European tours of the National Philharmonic Orchestra and Sinfonia Varsovia.

He has recorded for the Polish and foreign radio and television stations and has taken part in international festivals throughout Europe as well as in the United States and Japan.

His album with compositions by Schubert, Brahms, Schumann and others (released by Koch/Schwann) won the German Record Critics’ Award. He has also released works by Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Stravinsky, Messiaen and Panufnik as well as the Cello Concerto by Witold Lutosławski. In 2000, he made the Polish premiere recording of the complete cello suites (on 2 CDs) by J.S. Bach, released by CD Accord, for which he was awarded a “Fryderyk” prize conferred by the Polish Phonographic Academy (2000).

The repertoire he performs features new and latest music, including works specially composed for him. In 2002, during the Forty-Fourth International Festival of Contemporary Music “Warsaw Autumn” he appeared with a recital of world premieres composed for solo cello and electronic media. The project that he thus initiated (Cellotronicum) has been continued in the form of recordings and more world premieres at tHe teaches cello at the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw and the Feliks Nowowiejski Academy of Music in Bydgoszcz. He is also the founder and artistic supervisor of the Warsaw-based Cellonet Group.

He is now spending more and more time composing and improvising music.

Magdalena Bojanowicz

She graduated with distinction from the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw, where she studied cello with Andrzej Bauer and Bartosz Koziak, and from the University of the Arts Berlin, where she was taught by Jens Peter Maintz.

She has performed at such venues as the Tonhalle in Zürich, Royal Festival Hall in London, Kolarac Concert Hall in Belgrade, Moscow Conservatory Hall, Lviv Philharmonic Hall, Polish Radio’s Witold Lutosławski Concert Studio in Warsaw, National Philharmonic Hall in Warsaw and National Forum of Music in Wrocław.

The leading Polish composers, such as Paweł Szymański, Hanna Kulenty, Aleksander Nowak and Dariusz Przybylski, all dedicated to her their works for cello and orchestra. Highlights of her career also include numerous world premiere performances of solo and chamber music compositions. In 2021, she released an album with works for cello and electronics by Cezary Duchnowski.

Her repertoire, however, is not limited to recently composed works. She has recorded an album called Fairy tale with pianist Radosław Kurek with works by Strauss, Janáček, Poulenc, Webern, Dutilleux and Ibert, and a CD with chamber music written by Elsner, Krogulski and Dobrzyński.

As a soloist, she has appeared alongside the Symphony Orchestra of the National Philharmonic in Warsaw, Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra in Katowice, Leopoldinum Orchestra, NFM Wrocław Philharmonic Orchestra, Sinfonietta Cracovia, AUKSO Chamber Orchestra of the City of Tychy, Beethoven Academy Orchestra, Polish Orchestra Sinfonia Iuventus, Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra, among others. She has collaborated with such conductors as Massimiliano Caldi, George Tchitchinadze, Daniel Smith, Volker Schmidt-Gertenbach, Renato Rivolta, Marek Moś, Marzena Diakun, Michał Klauza, Tadeusz Wojciechowski, Jerzy Kosek, Michał Nesterowicz, Paweł Przytocki, Wojciech Rodek, Adam Klocek, Benjamin Lack, Ernst Kovacic, José Maria Florêncio and Wojciech Michniewski.

Bojanowicz won the first prize at the Forty-Fifth International Jeunesses Musicales Competition in Belgrade (2015), second prize and two special prizes at the Eighth Witold Lutosławski International Cello Competition in Warsaw, third prize at the First Krzysztof Penderecki International Cello Competition in Kraków, second prize at the Sixty-Ninth Ludwig van Beethoven International Cello Competition in Hradec nad Moravicí (Czech Republic) and an honourable mention at the Sixty-Fourth International Competition “Prague Spring”.

She has been a recipient of the Paszport Polityki – prestigious award presented to Polish creators of culture.

Henri Demarquette

It was at the tender age of thirteen that he enrolled at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique in Paris, where he studied with Philippe Muller and Maurice Gendron. He was unanimously awarded the Conservatoire’s first prize which led him to work with Pierre Fournier and Paul Tortelier in Paris and with Janos Starker in Bloomington, USA.

He made his concert debut at the age of seventeen in a recital at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris. He caught the attention of Yehudi Menuhin who invited him to play Dvořák’s Cello Concerto with him in Prague and Paris.

He has appeared in concerts worldwide with French and international orchestras such as the Orchestre National de France, London Philharmonic Orchestra, the Vienna Chamber Orchestra, Ensemble Orchestral de Paris, Tokyo Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre National Bordeaux Aquitaine, Sinfonia Varsovia and Neue Philharmonie Westfalen.

He has also performed with pianists: Boris Berezovsky, Michel Dalberto, Jean-Bernard Pommier, Fabrizio Chiovetta and Jean-Frédéric Neuburger. In 2015, he co-founded a string quartet with Augustin Dumay, Svetlin Roussev and Miguel da Silva.

The artist enthusiastically engages in stylistically varied projects. In 2014, he appeared in a duo with French accordionist Richard Galliano in a programme with music from Bach to Galliano, and premiered Contrastes for accordion, cello and orchestra with the Orchestre Royal de Chambre de Wallonie. That same year, together with Sequenza 9.3. vocal ensemble, he created Vocello – an original ensemble for cello and a cappella choir conducted by Catherine Simonpietri.

He teaches at the École Normale de Musique de Paris-Alfred Cortot.

Roel Dieltiens

The cellist Roel Dieltiens studied in Antwerp and Detmold. He swiftly made a name for himself on the international scene and is now regarded as an authority on both modern and baroque cello. His strong personality, musicality and unconventional approach took him right from the beginning of his career to all the world’s great concert centres (Paris, Berlin, London, New York, Moscow and Tokyo). He has also gained international recognition as a chamber musician and founder of the celebrated Ensemble Explorations. Since 2010 he has appeared in trio formation with Andreas Staier (piano) and Daniel Sepec (violin).

He has made a whole series of recordings for the Harmonia Mundi and Etcetera labels that have consistently received praise from the critics and aroused great public interest. Some quotations from the reviews that have greeted his CDs illustrate this nicely: simply the best (“Classic CD”, USA, on the recording of Kodály’s Sonata for solo cello, Op. 8); the only significant disc of cello music to appear in 1997 (“Fanfare”, USA, on his Franchomme CD); a distinguished disc, and the best Vivaldi recording for a long time (“Diapason”, France, on his first CD of cello concertos by Vivaldi). In 2010, for his recording of the Cello Suites by Johann Sebastian Bach he received the Caecilia Prize awarded by the Association of Belgian Music Critics and a prize of the Flemish radio station Klara, which specialises in classical and jazz music.

He is professor of cello at the Zurich University of the Arts and has served as a jury member in international competitions including the Leipzig Bach Competition, the Moscow Tchaikovsky Competition and the Queen Elisabeth International Music Competition of Belgium. In addition to this, he is associated with the Lemmensinstituut in Leuven, where he teaches chamber music.

Anssi Karttunen

Soloist and chamber musician, currently considered one of the most innovative cellists in the world. In his performances, he brings a fresh eye to canonical masterpieces while rediscovering long-forgotten works and creating his own, highly original transcriptions. He performs on a variety of cellos: modern, classical, baroque, piccolo and electric. The last one on the list features predominantly in the artist’s solo, interdisciplinary projects, where music is juxtaposed with electronics, images and videos.

He actively promotes contemporary music having taken part in more than two hundred world premiere performances in which he collaborated with such composers as Magnus Lindberg, Kaija Saariaho, Pascal Dusapin, Luca Francesconi and Tan Dun.

He has been a recipient of thirty-one newly composed concertos, including two concertos by Magnus Lindberg (Cello Concerto No. 1 performed with the Orchestre de Paris and Cello Concerto No. 2 performed with the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra), Mania by Esa-Pekka Salonen performed with the Avanti! Chamber Orchestra and Rest by Luca Francesconi performed with the Orchestra Sinfonica di Torino della RAI.

He was the dedicatee of Kaija Saariaho’s concerto titled Notes on Light, in whose premiere performance he was accompanied by the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 2007. Ever since then, he has performed it more than fifty times with such orchestras as the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, NDR Symphony Orchestra, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Orchestre de Paris and New World Symphony Orchestra.

In 2018, he was accompanied by the Swedish Chamber Orchestra in the world premiere performance of Betsy Jolas’s Side Roads. In 2020, he recorded the work on an album, this time in collaboration with the Orchestre d’Auvergne. The artist’s plans for the nearest future involve premiere performances of concertos composed by Ahmed Essyad, Ramon Lazkano and Sean Shepherd.

Yuri Laniuk

Composer, cellist, professor of the Mykola Lysenko Lviv National Music Academy. A recipient of the Levko Revutsky Ukrainian National Prize for composition (1990), Boris Lyatoshinsky Award (2001), Taras Shevchenko National Award (2005) and the first prize of the Mykola Lysenko Cello Competition in Kyiv (1979).

He had lessons with Mstislav Rostropovich in 1972 and was taught composition by Andrzej Nikodemowicz in 1975. Between 1975 and 1980, he studied cello with Yevhen Shpitzer and composition with Desiderius Zador at the then Lysenko Conservatory in Lviv. He completed his postgraduate studies in Kyiv with Vadim Chervov (1982).

HIs compositions have been presented in concert halls and at festivals in Austria, Belgium, Canada, Germany, Poland, Switzerland, Russia and the United States. They have been performed by such orchestras and ensembles as the National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine, Cleveland Chamber Symphony Orchestra, Edmonton Symphony Orchestra, German Radio Symphony Orchestra (MDR), Orchestra del Teatro Comunale di Bologna, Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra in Katowice, Sinfonia Varsovia, Canadian Sinfonietta, AUKSO Chamber Orchestra of the City of Tychy, Silesian Quartet, DAFO Quartet and Ensemble Recherche

He has collaborated with a number of highly esteemed conductors such as Grzegorz Nowak, Volodymyr Sirenko, Roman Kofman, Peter Gülke, Oksana Lyniv, Gary Kulesha, Virko Baley and Roman Rewakowicz as well as soloists, such as Ivan Monighetti, Andrzej Bauer and Olga Pasiecznik. He has been a member of the jury at international performance and composition competitions.

In 1999, the Polish record label CD Accord released a CD with the artist’s compositions published by Sordino from Switzerland.

In 2014, he was awarded the Honorary Medal „For Merit to Polish Culture” by the Minister of Culture and National Heritage of the Republic of Poland.

Jens Peter Maintz

Soloist, chamber musician, and cello teacher. He studied with David Geringas and has taken part in masterclasses with other great cellists such as Heinrich Schiff, Boris Pergamenschikow, Frans Helmerson and Siegfried Palm. He was further influenced by his intensive chamber music study with Uwe-Martin Haiberg and Walter Levin.

In 1994 he won first prize at the ARD International Music Competition, which had previously not been awarded to a cellist for seventeen years.

Ma za sobą doświadczenia koncertmistrza wiolonczel berlińskiej Deutsches Symphonieorchester i podróże koncertowe po całym świecie w składzie słynnego Trio Fontenay. Od 2006 roku jest koncertmistrzem Lucerne Festival Orchestra pod batutą Claudio Abbado.

He gathered several years of valuable orchestral experience as principal cello of the Deutsche Symphonie-Orchester in Berlin, and travelled the world as a member of the renowned Trio Fontenay. Since 2006 Jens Peter Maintz has been principal cello of the Lucerne Festival Orchestra, on the invitation of Claudio Abbado. His solo career has brought him into contact with conductors such as Vladimir Ashkenazy, Herbert Blomstedt, Marek Janowski, Franz Welser-Möst and Bobby McFerrin. He has appeared as a soloist with the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra, Leipzig MDR Symphony Orchestra, Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra, Den Haag Residenzorchester and Tokyo Symphony Orchestra.

He is also an esteemed chamber musician having cooperated with such virtuosos as Janine Jansen, Boris Brovtsyn, Torleif Thedéen, Hélène Grimaud, Kolja Blacher, Isabelle Faust and Antoine Tamestit, in addition to the Artemis, Carmina and Auryn Quartets. He has also played as the Cello Duello with Wolfgang Emanuel Schmidt for the last twenty-five years.

Jens Peter Maintz’s discography is as varied as his repertoire. His debut album for Sony Classical featuring works by Bach, Kodály and Dutilleux received the ECHO Klassik. He has also recorded Isang Yun’s concerto for the Capriccio label and a repertoire written by composers associated with Tchaikovsky for Arte Nova. Oehms Classics has released his rendition of Wilhelm Fitzenhagen’s compositions and Berlin Classics an album with Haydn’s concertos that he performed with the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen.

He has taught cello at the Berlin University of the Arts since 2004.

Tomasz Strahl

He graduated from the Fryderyk Chopin Academy of Music in Warsaw, where he was taught by Kazimierz Michalik, in 1989. As a holder of the Austrian Government scholarship he completed one-year postgraduate studies with Tobias Kühne at the Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst in Vienna.

A winner of numerous prestigious competitions, including the first prize at the Fifth Nicanor Zabaleta International Competition in San Sebastian, Spain (1991). In 1994, he was awarded a prize-scholarship of the Polish- Japanese Foundation JESC.

He has performed under such conductors as Krzysztof Penderecki, Andrzej Boreyko, Jan Krenz, Henryk Czyż, Philippe Entremont, Jerzy Maksymiuk, Antoni Wit, Wojciech Michniewski, Tomasz Bugaj, Marcin Nałęcz-Niesiołowski and Jerzy Salwarowski.

Throughout his long and illustrious career, he has given concerts alongside such renowned orchestras as Sinfonietta Cracovia, Sinfonia Varsovia, Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra in Katowice, National Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra, AUKSO Chamber Orchestra of the City of Tychy, Sofia Philharmonic Orchestra and Orquestra Sinfônica Municipal São Paulo (Brazil). He has made a number of world tours appearing in the most prestigious concert halls.

One of the highlights of his career was his rendition of the Cello Concerto by Witold Lutosławski under the baton of Mirosław Jacek Błaszczyk attended by the composer himself in 1993.

In 2005, he gave the Polish premiere performance of the Cello Concerto No. 2 by Piotr Moss at the Premieres Festival with the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, with which he recorded a rediscovered Concerto by Zygmunt Stojowski in the following year. He has made a number of recordings for Polish Radio and Polish Television as well as Radio CBC from Canada. His recordings have also been released by such labels as Pony Canyon, CD Accord, Pavane Records, Gema Stereo, Polmusic, Acte Préalable and Sony Classical. He has won three Fryderyk awards conferred by the Polish Phonographic Academy.

He works as professor at the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw. He regularly conducts masterclasses in Poland, the Netherlands, Finland, Germany, Japan and South America.

Strahl has received several national Polish honours of distinction: the Gold Cross of Merit (2002), the first class award of the Minister of Culture and National Heritage for his achievements in the fields of arts and education (2009), the The Gloria Artis Silver Medal for Merit to Culture (2010) and the Knight’s Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta.

Marcin Zdunik

He studied with Andrzej Bauer and Julius Berger and then went on to study musicology with Szymon Paczkowski at Warsaw University (Institute of Musicology).

He has appeared with solo recitals at a host of prestigious concert halls, such as Carnegie Hall in New York, Konzerthaus in Berlin, Cadogan Hall in London and Rudolfinum in Prague. He has been accompanied by excellent orchestras, including the Symphony Orchestra of the National Philharmonic in Warsaw, European Union Chamber Orchestra, Sinfonia Varsovia and City of London Sinfonia conducted by such maestros as Andrzej Boreyko, Antoni Wit and Andres Mustonen. He has appeared during the BBC Proms in London, Progetto Martha Argerich in Lugano and International “Chopin and his Europe” Music Festival in Warsaw. He has collaborated with Nelson Goener, Gerard Causs, Krzysztof Jabłoński and Krzysztof Jakowicz. He also appeared with Gidon Kremer and Yuri Bashmet during the “Chamber Music Connects the World” festival.

He won the first prize and Grand Prix at the Sixth Witold Lutosławski International Cello Competition in Warsaw and successfully represented Polish Radio (Polskie Radio) at the International Forum for Young Performers organised by the European Broadcasting Union. In 2009, he received the Guarantee of Culture (Gwarancja Kultury) award from TVP Kultura and in 2020 the Honorary Medal „For Merit to Polish Culture” from the Minister of Culture and National Heritage of the Republic of Poland.

His debut recording with the Chamber Orchestra Wratislavia, featuring two cello concerti composed by Joseph Haydn, received a “Fryderyk” award conferred by the Polish Phonographic Academy (2010). He was given the same award for his Words of Mystery recorded with the Katowice City Singers’ Ensemble Camerata Silesia (2021) and Cello Concerto No. 2 by Paweł Mykietyn recorded with the Orchestra of the National Forum of Music in Wrocław. He has also recorded complete works for cello and piano by Robert Schumann (with Aleksandra Świgut; NIFC 2014), Fantasia for cello and orchestra by Mieczysław Weinberg (with the orchestra Sinfonia Varsovia; TWON 2015) and chamber music by Fryderyk Chopin (with Szymon Nehring and Ryszard Groblewski; NIFC 2020). His discography also includes Bach Stories (on 2 CDs) recorded with Aleksander Dębicz.

Marcin Zdunik is also active as a composer. Some of his recent compositions include the Cello Concerto Ghosts of the Past (2021), the Piano Quartet (2022) as well as solo works and music for the theatre.

He is a professor of musical arts and teaches cello at the Academy of Music in Gdańsk and the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw.