The violinist María Dueñas enchants her audience with the breathtaking variety of colours she elicits from her instrument, her technical ability, her artistic maturity and her bold interpretations. She studies with the world-renowned violin teacher Boris Kuschnir at the College of Music and Performing Arts in her adopted home of Vienna. Born in Granada in 2002, she began taking lessons at the conservatory in her home town at the age of seven. A scholarship abroad took her to Dresden for two years in 2014, where she attracted the attention of conductor Marek Janowski, at whose invitation she later made her debut as soloist with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra.

After a series of first prizes at prestigious international competitions, María Dueñas caused a sensation in 2021, particularly at the Menuhin Violin Competition, where she won both first prize and the audience prize. This versatile musician, who is also a passionate composer, is now in worldwide demand and has already performed with many major orchestras. She has worked closely with conductors such as Gustavo Dudamel, Yannick Nézèt-Séguin and Manfred Honeck. As an exclusive Deutsche Grammophon artist, she released her first album – Beethoven and Beyond – with Manfred Honeck and the Vienna Symphony Orchestra in May 2023. The centrepiece of the recording is the Beethoven Violin Concerto with her own cadenzas.

María Dueñas plays the 17?4 Nicolò Gagliano violin, on loan from the German Foundation for Musical Life, and the 1710 Stradivarius ›Camposelice‹, on loan to her from the Nippon Music Foundation.

Estonian conductor and Grammy Award winner Paavo Järvi has been Artistic Director of the Deutsche Kammer­philharmonie Bremen since 2004. One of the many highlights of this collaboration has been the acclaimed, globally celebrated performances of the Beethoven cycle, for which Järvi received numerous awards including the ›Echo Klassik Conductor of the Year‹ award and the prestigious annual ›German Record Critics‹’ award. Their Beethoven project was followed by an intensive exploration of the symphonic works of Schumann and Brahms; both cycles also received numerous awards. Since autumn 2021, the focus has been on Joseph Haydn’s twelve London symphonies, and since 2024, an intensive exploration of Franz Schubert’s symphonies.

Paavo Järvi has been Music Director of the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich since the start of the 2019/2020 season. He is also the founder and Artistic Director of the Estonian Festival Orchestra and the Pärnu Music Festival, which he established in 2011. He regularly appears as a guest conductor with major orchestras such as the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam, the London Philharmonia Orchestra, the Berliner Philharmoniker, the Staatskapelle Dresden, the New York and Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestras and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. In 2015, he was named ›Artist of the Year‹ by both the British magazine Gramophone and the French magazine Diapason. This was followed in 2019 by the Opus Klassik award for ›Conductor of the Year‹. Other awards include a Grammy Award for his recording of Sibelius’ Cantatas with the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra and the title ›Commandeur de L’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres‹, awarded by the French Ministry of Culture. In 2015, Paavo Järvi also received the Sibelius Medal in recognition of his work in bringing this Finnish composer’s music to a wider audience, and in 2012 he received the Hindemith Prize for Art and Humanity. As a committed supporter of Estonian culture, Paavo Järvi was awarded the Order of the White Star by the President of Estonia in 2013.