Since 1993, Daniel Sepec has been concertmaster with The Deutsche Kammer­philharmonie Bremen, with which he also appears regularly as a soloist. He has recorded two CDs with the orchestra featuring works by Johann Sebastian Bach as well as Antonio Vivaldi’s ›Four Seasons‹, on which he also directed himself.

He has also appeared several times as guest concertmaster with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe (including a tour with Claudio Abbado), Camerata Academica Salzburg and the Ensemble Oriol Berlin. As a soloist he has performed with the Academy of Ancient Music under Christopher Hogwood, the Vienna Academy of Music under Martin Haselböck and the Orchestre des Champs-Elysées under Philippe Herreweghe.

His CD recording of H. I. F. Biber’s Rosary Sonatas received the German Record Critics’ Award. Daniel Sepec is the only musician to date to have recorded a CD on a rediscovered violin formerly belonging to Ludwig van Beethoven together with pianist Andreas Staier. As a member of the Arcanto Quartet, he has made recordings of the Mozart, Brahms, Debussy, Ravel, Bartók and Dutilleux string quartets, as well as Schubert’s String Quartet.

From September 2010 until July 2014, he was professor at the School of Music in Basle. In 2014, he was offered a professorship at Lübeck University of Music.

While the timpani usually tends to be played over long stretches as an accompaniment and acoustically in the background, Stefan Rapp manages to play each individual note in a positively soloistic manner. He learned this art in Freiburg and in masterclasses with renowned percussionists and timpani players such as Peter Sadlo, David Searcy, Isao Nakamura and Steven Shick.

As a timpanist he has worked with the conductors Claudio Abbado, Leonard Bernstein and Daniel Harding. One particularly fascinating experience was his collaboration with the Ensemble Modern.
Following a very brief stint at the Royal Opera in Copenhagen, Stefan Rapp became timpanist with The Deutsche Kammer­philharmonie Bremen in 1996. From 1997 to 2004, he held percussion classes at the University of the Arts in Bremen.

Stefan Rapp is equally passionate about playing the timpani and percussion. In 1997, together with Marcus Linke and Slavik Stakhov, he founded ANTARES – The German Percussion Collective, with which he enjoys playing classical percussion compositions and especially experimental pieces.

For a number of years, he organized the concert series ›Back to the Roots‹ produced for and with him by The Deutsche Philharmonie Bremen, in which he presented his version of music integrated with other arts together with orchestra colleagues and external guests at very different venues in Bremen.

Stefan also dedicates much of his free time to music, either playing bass in his band or at home on the guitar. It is important to him to feel at home in different styles, including freestyle and improvisation, and to experiment with combining these in his music. He also enjoys spending quality time with his son and seeing the world through his eyes.

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