ALUMNI (2014–2016)
Henriette Otto, violin
Henriette Otto, born in Leipzig in 1989, was given her first violin lessons by Prof. Ruth Boche. After her education at the Schloss Belvedere Music School in Weimar she commenced her studies in the city with Prof. Anne-Kathrin Lindig, moving in 2010 to the violin class of Prof. Elisabeth Kufferath at the University of Music, Drama and Media (HMTM) in Hanover, where she graduated Master early in 2017. At the time she made this switch, she also began studying Baroque violin with Prof. Anne Röhrig.
Master classes with such eminent exponents as Prof. Thomas Brands, Anne Schumann, Prof. Alexandre Brussilovsky and Ida Haendel, coupled with two months at the Aspen Music Festival, Colorado (USA), gave her added inspiration. Henriette has won several first prizes at national level in Germany’s “Jugend musiziert” competition for young musicians.
Participation in various ensembles has given Henriette ample experience of chamber music and orchestral playing. She was a founder member of Ensemble Giocoso and a member of the German Youth Orchestra (BJO) and the Leipzig Chamber Philharmonic. She has been a member of Hanover’s “Orchester im Treppenhaus” since 2010 and also plays regularly with the orchestras “La festa musicale” and “Berlin Baroque”.
Mladen Somborac, viola
Mladen Somborac was born in Šibenik, Croatia, in 1991 and took his first violin lessons at the age of seven at the school of music in Montenegro. When he was eleven years old he moved to Belgrade in Serbia and completed his studies at the city’s musical middle school. At 17 he began playing the viola and was soon a much-sought-after soloist and chamber musician. Repeated competition successes (2nd prize at the 2009 International Competition in Nis, Serbia; 2nd prize in the Republic of Serbia Competition in Belgrade in 2010) attest to his artistic ability. After only two years of instruction in the viola he was admitted to the class of Thomas Riebl at the Salzburg Mozarteum, where he graduated Bachelor in 2014. He is currently pursuing his Master’s degree with William Coleman.
He has attended the master classes of Urlich von Wrochem, Hartmut Rohde, Peter Langgartner and Tatjana Masurenko.
Orchestral experience has come to him as a member of the Central Europe Youth Orchestra in 2010, the Wiener Jeunesse Orchester in 2013, the Cuban-European Youth Academy in 2015 and 2016, and in the ensembles Salzburg Chamber Soloists, Camerata Salzburg and oenm – Austrian ensemble for new music.
Mladen is an enthusiastic chamber musician and his fellow-performers have included Wolfgang Redik and William Coleman, Clemens Hagen, Veronika Hagen and Reiner Schmidt (Hagen Quartet), William Coleman (Kuss Quartet), Milan Milojicic (Minetti Quartet), Alasdair Tait and Louis Hopkins.
Since September 2016 he has been an academy member of the viola group at the Komische Oper Berlin.
Luisa Höfs, violin
Luisa Höfs was born in 1991 and grew up in a musical family. Her first violin lessons came when she was five, given by Prof. Marianne Petersen. She was a junior student of the Andreas Franke Academy at Hamburg’s College of Music and Drama from 2008 to 2010, receiving instruction in her primary instrument from Prof. Christoph Schickedanz, before commencing her Bachelor course in 2010 with Prof. Anke Dill at the State College of Music and Dramatic Art in Stuttgart. She received further instruction from Prof. Maria Egelhof (Lübeck College of Music), Florin Paul (Leader of the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra) and Prof. Ulf Schneider (HMTM – University of Music, Drama and Media in Hanover).
She acquired orchestral experience with the German Chamber Philharmonic of Bremen, the Flensburg Bach Ensemble, Hamburg Camerata and the Junge Deutsche Philharmonie.
She joined forces with three fellow-students in 2011 to found the Pierrot Quartet, which only a few months after its foundation won a first prize at the 2012 Carl Wendling Chamber Music Competition. The quartet has been studying since the winter term of 2016 with Prof. Oliver Wille at HMTM Hanover. Since graduating, Luisa Höfs has applied herself with great dedication to Early Music. She has learnt much from Prof. Christine Busch, Prof. Frithjof Smith and Prof. Jörg Halubek.
Luisa Höfs won an audition with the Duisburg Philharmonic at the beginning of 2017 and from May 2017 she will be playing in the Deutsche Oper am Rhein.
Lorenzo Meseguer, violoncello
Born in Murcia in 1990, Lorenzo Meseguer Luján pursued his cello studies at eminent institutions first in the south and then in the Nnorth of Europe. After graduating with distinction from the Madrid Conservatory, he moved to Salzburg in 2011 to study with Enrico Bronzi at the Mozarteum; from 2013 he studied at the Royal Academy of Music in London, where he completed his Master’s degree with distinction.
Lorenzo has scored many competition successes; he has also performed, both as soloist and as an orchestral cellist, in various ensembles in Germany, Austria, France, Italy and South America.
Lorenzo is a member and deputy solo cellist in the Castile and León Symphony Orchestra (Spain) and occupies the same position in the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra.