Christian Funke (born 1949) is a German violinist, concertmaster and Professor for violin. Since 1987 he has been the conductor of the Bachorchester zu Leipzig.
Funke, born in Dresden in 1949, studied at the Hochschule für Musik Carl Maria von Weber from 1959 to 1966 and then continued his studies at the Moscow Conservatory with Igor Bezrodnyi.
After his Staatsexamen in 1972, he was engaged as 1st concertmaster at the Staatskapelle Dresden. Since 1979, he was 1st concertmaster of the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig. As soloist, he has played many violin concertos, among others by Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, Brahms, Mozart, Sibelius, Shostakovich and Stravinski with the Gewandhaus Orchestra.
Funke won numerous prizes in national and international competitions, including a second prize in the violin category at the 1968 edition of the International Johann Sebastian Bach Competition.
In 1986, he was appointed professor for violin at the Hochschule für Musik Franz Liszt, Weimar. He also holds an Honorary Professorship at the University of Music and Theatre Leipzig. [1]
He has played several times Bach's Concerto for Two Violins together with Igor Oistrakh and Maxim Vengerov. Furthermore, he was able to win soloists like Sergei Nakariakov for the ensemble. [2]
As a soloist, he is a frequent guest with renowned orchestras and chamber music evenings or at music festivals like the Walkenrieder Kreuzgangkonzerte. [3]
Funke plays a violin from the famous Italian luthier Gagliano. [4]
Numerous vinyl and CDs recordings are available.
Josef Paul Labor was an Austrian pianist, organist, and composer of the late Romantic era. Labor was an influential music teacher. As a friend of some key figures in Vienna, his importance was enhanced.
Max Rostal was a violinist and a viola player. He was Austrian-born, but later took British citizenship.
Daniel Müller-Schott is a German cellist.
Mikhail Emmanuilovich Goldstein, was a German composer, violinist and violin teacher of German-Jewish origin, brother of prominent violinist Boris Goldstein. His great uncle was the physicist Eugen Goldstein.
Alois Kottmann was a German violinist, music pedagogue, university professor and patron. He was based in Frankfurt, where he founded several ensembles, and taught at both the Hoch Conservatory and the Musikhochschule Frankfurt. He founded concert series in the area, and a prize for young violinists.
Hugo Gottesmann was an Austrian violinist, violist, conductor, and chamber musician. A highly decorated soldier in World War I, his career in Vienna as a conductor and violinist was truncated with the advent of the Third Reich in 1933. He was fired from his positions at Radio Wien, the Vienna Symphony, and the Academie für Musik and forced to seek work elsewhere in Europe and emigrate to the United States.
Sigwart Botho Philipp August zu Eulenburg, Count of Eulenburg was the second son of Philipp, Prince of Eulenburg (1847–1921) and his wife Augusta, born Countess of Sandels (1853–1941) and a German late romantic composer who fell in the First World War.
Siegfried Köhler was a German composer in the German Democratic Republic.
Hans-Christian Bartel was a German violist and composer.
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.
Abraham "Bram" Eldering was a Dutch violinist and music pedagogue.
Karl Bleyle was an Austrian composer and musician, who also lived and worked in Germany.
Eva Ander, married name Ander-Dunckel, was a German pianist and music educator.
Ernst Gröschel was a German pianist. Gröschel studied with Emil von Sauer and others in Vienna. He is regarded as the first pianist who played Mozart and Beethoven completely on historical keyboard instruments. He was a member of the Bamberg Piano Quartet. He left behind a large number of recordings both on vinyl and in the archives of the Bayerischer Rundfunk.
Josef Pembaur was an Austrian pianist and composer.
Stephan König is a German composer, pianist and conductor. He is the musical director of the "LeipJAZZig-Orkester" and the chamber orchestra "artentfaltung" and is considered one of the most authoritative Jazz musicians in Leipzig.
Alfred Lipka was a German violist.
Jörg Faßmann is a German violinist and academic teacher for music.
Rolf Kleinert was a German conductor.
Helmut Branny is a German conductor, double bassist and professor of chamber music at the Hochschule für Musik Carl Maria von Weber Dresden. He is a member of the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden, musical director of the Dresdner Kapellsolisten and the Cappella Musica Dresden. With the Kapellsolisten, he has made many recordings, and toured internationally.