GERMAN STRING PHILHARMONIC

Editor-in-Chief, ZDF

© ZDF, Jens Hartmann

From “Morgenmagazin” to “WISO” and “Aktuelles Sportstudio” – as ZDF Editor-in-Chief Peter Frey is responsible for these and many other shows. Since 2010 he has worked on and off camera in Mainz. Frey was also born on the Rhine – in Bingen. Before returning there six years ago, he familiarized himself not only with various editorial offices throughout the German media landscape, but also with very different places all over the world. He has worked as a journalist since 1978: while still a student of political sciences, pedagogics and Romance languages, he began working for the Südwestfunk, as it was then known, and the Frankfurter Rundschau. After that he moved on to Washington, where he reported about the Gulf War, among other issues, as the ZDF correspondent. Back in Berlin, he established the “ZDF Morgenmagazin” from 1992 to 1998. As the director of the ZDF’s editorial desk for foreign affairs, he moderated the show “auslandsjournal”, among others. Reporting trips have taken him all over the Middle East, Russia, the USA and Eastern Europe. Major events also fell within his tenure as director of the ZDF Capital Studio: he presented special broadcasts covering the elections of Pope Benedict XVI, Pope Francis and Barack Obama as US President.

© Marco Berggreve

As chief conductor of the German String Philharmonic, Wolfgang Hentrich draws upon his many years of experience as an orchestral violinist. Since two decades, the 50-year-old has held the position of first concertmaster of the Dresden Philharmonic Orchestra; before he was appointed to the same position at the Robert Schumann Philharmonic Orchestra in Chemnitz at the age of only 21. Following the model of the legendary Viennese concertmaster Willi Boskovsky, Hentrich conducted numerous New Year’s Concert with both orchestras since 1999. He also leads the Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra Dresden, holds an honorary professorship at the Dresden Music Academy and dedicates himself with particular enthusiasm to special programmes for children. Among his CD recordings, orchestral works by Johann Strauß, Mozart’s Violin Sonatas and compositions by Paganini for violin and guitar stand out. In August 2013, Hentrich became Michael Sanderling’s successor as chief conductor of the German String Philharmonic.

A native of Korea, Yura Lee loves her “double life”: she performs both as a violinist and violist. And she divides her time between the USA and Germany. In the USA, where she grew up from 1994 onwards, she made her Carnegie Hall debut at the age of 14, and in 2003 Lorin Maazel invited her to perform on a summer tour of the New York Philharmonic. In 2008 Yura Lee won the Leopold Mozart Competition in Augsburg; this was followed by further prizes, e.g. in 2009 at the Joseph Joachim Competition in Hanover and in 2013 at the ARD Competition in Munich (1st Prize in the viola category). A sought-after soloist and chamber musician, she has performed at the greatest festivals, such as Salzburg, Verbier, Ravinia and Marlboro. Her chamber music partners include András Schiff, Gidon Kremer, Leonidas Kavakos and Mitsuko Uchida. In 2008 Yura Lee recorded the CD Mozart in Paris with Reinhard Goebel and the Bavarian Chamber Philharmonic. In 2014 she was appointed professor at the Carl Maria von Weber Music Academy in Dresden.
www.yuralee.com