Schubert: Signed Herreweghe

^2026-2027

Philippe Herreweghe was born in Ghent and studied at both the university and music conservatory there. During this period, he started conducting and founded Collegium Vocale Gent in 1970. Philippe Herreweghe’s energetic, authentic and rhetorical approach to baroque music was soon drawing praise. In 1977 he founded the ensemble La Chapelle Royale in Paris, with whom he performed music of the French Golden Age. He founded several ensembles with whom he made historically appropriate and well-thought-out interpretations of repertoire stretching from the Renaissance to contemporary music. They include the Ensemble Vocal Européen, specialised in Renaissance polyphony, and the Orchestre des Champs Élysées, founded in 1991 with the aim of playing pre-Romantic and Romantic repertoire on original instruments. Last season Philippe Herreweghe, together with soloists Magdalena Kožená and Andrew Staples, presented Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde in historic timbres.

Highlights of the 2025/2026 season include concert tours with the Collegium Vocale Gent, which will take the ensemble to the major concert halls of South Korea with J.S. Bach’s Mass in B minor, as well as concert tours with the Orchestre des Champs-Élysées, with whom he will perform Luigi Cherubini’s Requiem at the Bozar in Brussels, the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg and the Philharmonie Essen, among others. Together with the Orchestre des Champs Élysées, he will also perform Schubert’s “Unfinished” and Ludwig van Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7 on a tour of South America with concerts in Sao Paolo, Buenos Aires and Rio de Janeiro.

In September 2021, Philippe Herreweghe will return to the Musikfest Bremen with concerts together with Orchestre des Champs-Élysées and Collegium Vocale Gent. Having already made his Musikfest debut in 1996 with the choir and orchestra of the Collegium Vocale Gent, he will be honoured in 2021 with the Musikfest Award Bremen for his outstanding artistic work. In addition, Herreweghe was awarded the “Ultima” cultural prize for general cultural merit by the Flemish government in the same year.

Philippe Herreweghe has received numerous awards for his consistent artistic imagination and commitment. In 1990 the European music press named him “Musical Personality of the Year”. Philippe Herreweghe and Collegium Vocale Gent were appointed “Cultural Ambassadors of Flanders” in 1993. A year later he was awarded the Belgian order of Officier des Arts et Lettres, and in 1997 he was awarded an honorary doctorate from the Catholic University of Leuven. In 2003 he received the French title Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur. In 2010 the city of Leipzig awarded him its Bach-Medaille for his great service as a performer of Bach. In 2017 Philippe Herreweghe received an honorary doctorate at Ghent University.

Violinist Christian Tetzlaff is highly acclaimed for his expressive, insightful and personal interpretations. His individual approach to the score, always searching for the emotional and structural depth of the composition, has built a loyal following over time who often describe his performance as an existential experience. Since his spectacular debuts with the Schönberg violin concerto in 1988 in Berlin, Munich and Cleveland, he has appeared with major orchestras of the highest calibre such as Berlin, Vienna, New York Philharmonics, the Boston and Chicago Symphony Orchestras, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra and many others. He performs an extensive repertoire ranging from Bach’s solo sonatas and partitas to lesserknown concertos by Giovanni Battista Viotti and Joseph Joachim, to contemporary works by György Ligeti, Jörg Widmann and Thomas Ades. In 2023 he took over the artistic direction of the SPANNUNGEN Festival in Heimbach, Germany.

In the 2025/2026 season Tetzlaff features as Artist-in-Residence of the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin and performs concertos by Berg, Suk and Dvořák as well as chamber music with Vladimir Jurowski. In February 2026 he gives the world premiere of Ondrej Adamek’s Violin Concerto No. 2 in Paris, with subsequent national premieres in Switzerland and the Czech Republic. Further highlights of the season include duo recitals with Leif-Ove Andsnes, solo violin recitals in Berlin, Oslo and London, and concerts with the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, Wiener Symphoniker, SWR Symphonieorchester, Helsinki Philharmonic, and the NHK Symphony Orchestra.

Tetzlaff collaborates with many of today’s leading conductors, including Herbert Blomstedt, Karina Canellakis, Maxim Emelyanychev, Christoph Eschenbach, Daniele Gatti, Daniel Harding, Manfred Honeck, Jakub Hrůša, Marie Jacquot, Paavo Järvi, Vladimir Jurowski, Cristian Măcelaru, Andris Nelsons, Gianandrea Noseda, Sakari Oramo, Sir Antonio Pappano, Kirill Petrenko, Sir Simon Rattle, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Jukka-Pekka Saraste, John Storgårds, Robin Ticciati, and Juraj Valčuha.

Chamber music has been an integral part of his career. In 1994 he founded the Tetzlaff Quartet with his sister, cellist Tanja Tetzlaff. The ensemble tours each season and performs in 2025/26 in Germany and the United Kingdom. Tetzlaff Quartet was awarded a Diapason d’or de l’année in 2015 for their recording of Berg’s Lyric Suite and Mendelssohn. Christian and Tanja Tetzlaff also perform regularly as a trio with pianist Kiveli Dörken.

His extensive discography, primarily on the Ondine label, has received the Jahrespreis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik, several Diapason d’or awards and the Midem Classical Award. Recent highlights include Sibelius with the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra and Nick Collon, and Brahms piano quartets which were the last recordings of the late Lars Vogt. Elgar and Adès violin concertos with the BBC Philharmonic and John Storgårds are being released in autumn 2025. He has recorded Bach’s solo violin works three times.

Christian Tetzlaff performs on a violin made by Peter Greiner. He teaches at the Kronberg Academy, and lives in Berlin with his wife, photographer Giorgia Bertazzi, and their three children.