Beata Heuer-Christen (born 27 February 1935) is a Swiss-German soprano concert singer and voice teacher.
Born in Bern, Heuer-Christen is the daughter of the violinist and member of the Bern Symphony Orchestra, Caesar Christen, [1] [2] and Greti Christen-Schiffmann, [1] also violinist in the Bern Symphony Orchestra and Primaria [2] of the Schiffmann Quartet.
Heuer-Christen studied singing in Bern with Maria Helbling, [1] in Freiburg with Margarethe von Winterfeldt [1] and in Zurich with Dorothea Ammann-Goesch. [3] After her studies, she first worked as a classical concert singer [1] in oratorios, Lieder recitals, radio and television recordings in various countries. Her main focus was in the field of Neue Musik. She has performed world premieres under the direction of Arturo Tamayo, Hans Zender and Wolfgang Fortner.
Since 1962, she was a lecturer and from 1980 to 2005 professor for singing at the Hochschule für Musik Freiburg. [2] She also gave master classes [4] in the fields of oratorio, opera and lied.
Among her students are prize winners of national and international competitions as well as concert singers or singers with engagements at opera houses in Paris, Munich, Hamburg, Vienna, Dresden, Leipzig, Bern, Geneva and Basel. Among them are Maria Bengtsson, [5] Rachel Harnisch, Bernhard Richter, Clemens Morgenthaler, Benoît Haller and Markus Flaig.
The Zelt-Musik-Festival (ZMF) has taken place every June and July since 1983 in Freiburg im Breisgau, Germany. It lasts three weeks and counts up to 120,000 visitors each year. The program is very broad. There is music, art, theater, cabaret and sport in different tents and on open-air stages. According to the organizer it is the biggest and oldest music festival in Baden-Württemberg. Over the years, more than 600 regional and international artists offered a diverse program consisting of classic, jazz, rock, pop and world music, cabaret and children's program. Also, many newcomers have been promoted.
Hanno Müller-Brachmann is a German bass-baritone who made an international career in both opera and concert. A member of the Berlin State Opera from 1998 to 2011, he first sang Mozart roles such as Papageno and Figaro, and created roles in premieres such as Mephistopheles in Dusapin's Faustus, the Last Night in 2006.
Reinhold Hammerstein was a German musicologist.
Michael Radanovics is an Austrian violinist and composer.
Thomas Walter Buchholz is a German composer and music educator.
Hans Jürgen Wenzel was a German conductor and composer. He was chairman of the Verband der Komponisten und Musikwissenschaftler der DDR and professor for musical composition at the Hochschule für Musik Carl Maria von Weber Dresden.
Karl Johannes Max Strub was a German violin virtuoso and eminent violin pedagogue. He gained a Europe-wide reputation during his 36 years of activity as primarius of the Strub Quartet. Stations as concertmaster led him from the 1920s to the operas of Stuttgart, Dresden and Berlin. Appointed Germany's youngest music professor at the Hochschule für Musik Franz Liszt, Weimar in 1926, he followed calls to the Berlin University of the Arts and, after the Second World War to the Hochschule für Musik Detmold. Strub was a connoisseur of the classical-romantic repertoire, but also devoted himself to modern music, among others he gave the world premiere of Hindemith's Violin Sonata No. 2 in D major. He promoted the music of Hans Pfitzner. Strub played on a Stradivari violin until 1945; numerous recordings from the 1930s/40s document his work.
Gerhard Tittel is a German composer and conductor.
Nicolaus Richter de Vroe is a German composer and violinist.
Rachel Harnisch is a Swiss operatic soprano.
Hans Eugen Frischknecht is a Swiss composer, organist, choral conductor and harpsichordist.
Walter Schartner was a German conductor, composer and Hochschullehrer. In 1946, he was appointed Generalmusikdirektor in Halle and as such he directed the Orchestra of the Halle Opera House. In 1949/50, he was chief conductor of the Philharmonisches Staatsorchester Halle.
Werner Grobholz was a German violinist.
Lukas Florian David was an Austrian classical violinist.
Willy Horváth was a German violinist.
Michael Gläser is a German singer, choral conductor and academic teacher. He was artistic director of broadcasters' choirs including the Rundfunkchor Berlin and the choir of the Bayerischer Rundfunk. He has been professor of choral conducting and Protestant church music at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater München from 1994. Two recordings for which he conducted a choir were nominated for the Grammy Awards.
Fritz Reuter was a German musicologist, music educator, composer and Kapellmeister. Reuter was one of the most important German music educators of the 20th century. After studying music and musicology in Dresden and Leipzig, with Teichmüller, Riemann, Schering and Abert, he received his doctorate in 1922. In 1945, he was appointed Kapellmeister at the Volksoper in Dresden. In 1949, he was appointed as the first professor of music education at a German university. He was also director of institutes at the Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg and the Humboldt University Berlin. In 1955, he was one of the initiators of the first Hallische Musiktage.
Christian Kluttig is a German conductor, pianist and Hochschullehrer. From 1979 to 1990, he was chief conductor of the Orchester des Opernhauses Halle. Appointed General Music Director in 1983, he worked as such at the theatres in Halle (Saale) and Theater Koblenz. The Handel interpreter rendered special services to the implementation of Historically informed performance in the Saale city, which made him one of the most important protagonists in this field in the GDR. He also devoted himself to Neue Musik, premiering Reiner Bredemeyer's opera Candide.
Martin Schneider was a German opera director and former Hochschullehrer.
Arno Lücker is a German composer, musicologist, music critic and music dramaturge. He worked as a journalist in Berlin for press and radio, and as dramaturge at the Konzerthaus Berlin where he installed the series 2 x hören, presenting the same music twice. He has been lecturer of musicology at the University of Marburg, and journalist for Opernwelt, the leading trade journal for opera.