Eckart Runge & Jacques Ammon
Biography Eckart Runge & Jacques Ammon
Eckart Runge
was born in Heidelberg and studied with Edmond Baert in Brussels and David Geringas in Lübeck. Prizes at the Premio Stradivari Cremona and the ARD Quartet Competition in Munich, among others, laid the foundation for his versatile concert activity.
For thirty years he was cellist of the Artemis Quartet, with which he performed worldwide and shaped its characteristic profile through all instrumentations. The ensemble's albums, including the Beethoven complete recording, have won multiple Diapason d'Or, Grammophone Awards and four ECH0 Classics.
In 2019 Eckart Runge decided to go his own artistic way, to dedicate himself to soloistic projects, especially to his other great passion, the border crossings between classical music and jazz, tango, rock and film music. For his solo debut album, Eckart Runge has chosen the premiere recording of the jazzy Cello Concerto op. 85 by Nikolai Kapustin and the 1st Cello Concerto by Alfred Schnittke with the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin. Runge will present the European premiere of John William's Cello Concerto with the Munich Symphony Orchestra in 2020.
As a professor at the Berlin University of the Arts and at the Chapelle de la Reine Elisabeth in Brussels, he has been passing on his experience since 2005.
Eckart Runge plays a rare cello made by the brothers Hieronymus and Antonio Amati in Cremona in 1595, generously loaned to him by Merito String Instrument Trust Vienna.
Jacques Ammon
Born in Santiago de Chile to German-Chilean parents, Jacques Ammon first attracted attention in 1989 as the first prize winner of the International Claudio Arrau Piano Competition. Jacques Ammon began his studies as a pupil of Margarita Herrera in Santiago and continued them in 1990 with Konrad Elser at the Musikhochschule Lübeck.
Jacques Ammon performs regularly as a soloist and chamber musician in the most renowned concert halls in Germany and Europe (including the Vienna Konzerthaus, Chatelet Paris, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Wigmore Hall London, Palau de la Musica Barcelona) as well as in Russia, Japan, Chile, Argentina and the USA. Many of his concerts have been documented on radio stations such as Radio France, BBC and ARD.
At the invitation of the 12 cellists of the Berlin Philharmonic, Jacques Ammon was artistic advisor for a CD production (EMI) of Latin American music, which received a Grammy nomination. In 2009 he participated in an album by the Artemis Quartet (Warner/Erato) with music by Astor Piazzolla. In addition to the duo with Eckart Runge, he regularly plays with violinist Daniel Hope. This collaboration has resulted in several albums on the Deutsche Grammophon label.
Jacques Ammon also works as a passionate teacher at festivals including the International Chamber Music Course of the Jeunesses Musicales in Weikersheim, Karlsruhe Master Classes, Akademie Hohenstaufen, Schloß Neuhardenberg and since 2011 as Artistic Director of the CMMC in Frutillar / Chile.
Since 2015 Jacques Ammon has been professor of piano at the Felix - Mendelssohn - Bartholdy University of Music and Theatre in Leipzig.
