Sophie Schafleitner, violin
Sophie Schafleitner was born in Salzburg in 1974. Following her training with Irmgard Gahl at the Salzburg Mozarteum, she completed her violin studies with Gerhard Schulz at the University of Music, Vienna.
Sophie Schafleitner joined Klangforum Wien in 1997. In addition to her work as ensemble musician and soloist, she is also active in various other chamber music formations such as the Schrammelquartett Attensam, or the music group Knoedel.
Composers such as Aureliano Cattaneo, Liza Lim, Hannes Kerschbaumer and Ying Wang have dedicated solo-pieces to her. Recent highlights include the Austrian première of Brice Pauset’s violin concerto as well as concert appearances with the Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra in Warsaw and Katowice where she performed the violin-concertos by Alban Berg and Aureliano Cattaneo.
In 2014, she started a close artistic collaboration with Christoph Marthaler and as a result has appeared as soloist in various music theatre productions.
Sophie Schafleitner is also active in the context of Klangforum Wien’s professorship, participating in the master programme for New Music PPCM at the University of Music in Graz.
Gerald Preinfalk, saxophone
Gerald Preinfalk was born in Zulissen near Freistadt in Upper Austria. In 1990, he started to study classical saxophone with Oto Vrhovnik and jazz with Wolfgang Puschnig at the University of Music in Vienna, and as a result made music his vocation. Scholarships took him to the Berklee College of Music in Boston (USA) and to Paris.
Preinfalk joined Klangforum Wien in 2000. He has toured with orchestras such as the Vienna Philharmonic, the RSO - Radio-Symphony Orchestra Vienna, the Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland Pfalz, the Staatsorchester Stuttgart and other ensembles for new music in and around Vienna.
He has also performed jazz as sideman with various big bands such as Nouvelle Cousine, the Vienna Art Orchestra and other ensembles, playing with musicians like Don Byron (NYC), Django Bates (GB), George Garzone (NYC), Elliot Sharp (NYC); Terry Bozzio (USA Frank Zappa drummer), Savina Yannatou (BR), Lucia Pulido (CO), Alegre Corrêa (BR) and Wolfgang and Christian Muthspiel (A).
In 2012, Gerald Preinfalk was appointed professor for classical saxophone at the University of Music, Graz. Masterclasses have taken him to Strasbourg, Wroclaw (PL), Szczecinek (PL), Tikushima (JP) and Tianjin (CHN).
Dimitrios Polisoidis, viola
Dimitrios Polisoidis was born in Thessaloniki, Greece, in 1961. He studied the violin with Dany Dossiou in his home town and later attended the University of Music, Graz, where he was taught by Christos Poyzoides and also studied the viola with Herbert Blendinger. From 1990 to 1993 he was principal viola player of the Philharmonic Orchestra, Graz, and in 1993 became a member of Klangforum Wien.
Dimitrios Polisoidis is devoting himself mainly to new music and to performing with experimental improvisation groups. He was artistic collaborator in several live electronic projects at the Electronic Institute of the University of Music, Graz, (IEM Graz). He has performed internationally and worked with many renowned composers such as Peter Ablinger, Georg Friedrich Haas, Bernhard Lang, Klaus Lang, Gösta Neuwirth, Olga Neuwirth and George Lopez, who wrote works especially for him.
In 2012, the federal state of Styria awarded him the “Karl Böhm Interpreter’s Prize”. He teaches at the University of Music, Graz and at the Impuls Academy as well as at the International Holiday Courses in Darmstadt. His CD recordings have been released by the labels hatART (Basle), Kairos (Vienna), Klangschnitte (Graz), mode rec (NY), and Lyra (Athens).
Krassimir Sterev, accordion
Gregory Chalier, flutes
Gregory began to play the flute at the age of 8 in Catherine Stutz’s class in the Conservatoire de musique of Geneva.
When he was 16 years old, Gregory took part in the preprofessional section of the Conservatoire de Musique of Geneva and played as first flute in several youth Orchestra.
At 19 years Gregory entered Michel Bellavance’s class in the Haute Ecole de Musique of Geneva. During five years, Gregory worked with Michel Bellavance and had the chance to play in Masterclasses for great flutists like Patrick Gallois, Emmanuel Pahud, Paolo Taballione and Andrea Lieberknecht. Gregory finished successfully his Master degree in June 2016 and studied since september 2019 with Adam Walker. Since spring 2021, he is a member of the PPCM with the Klangforum Wien and studies with Vera Fischer.
Gregory is also very active as a chamber musician in a lot of different formations as a member of the Ensemble Hegoa. He played with musicians such as Adam Walker, Nora Cismondi, Raphael Christ, Fredrik Ekdahl and Dimitrios Polisoidis and in major European festivals such as Wien Modern, Impuls Festival or Festival Musica sull’Acqua.
Elena Arbonies, clarinets
Elena Arbonies comes from Durango, a town from the Basque Country, in the north of Spain. There she began her music and clarinet studies when she was 10: first as a hobby, and later as a passion. When she was 16, she had the opportunity to perform in a young orchestra, the reason why she decided to dedicate her life to music.
She did her Bachelor clarinet studies in Musikene - San Sebastián (Spain) with José Luis Estellés, Anthony Pay and bass clarinet with Henri Bok. After that, she went to Codarts - Rotterdam to continue with the Master studies under the guidance of Nancy Braithwaite. Now she is enrolled in the Master PPCM in Graz.
Elena has performed in both young and professional orchestras and has offered clarinet recitals in Spain and the Netherlands. She has been awarded with the “7th Young Basque Musicians Competition”, the Scholarship for young musicians of Vizcaya (Spain), and has reached the final of the Grachtenfestival Conservatorium Concours and Prix D’Harmonie Competition Rotterdam.
She is currently interested in the connection between music and theater, and is involved in a music and theater project for children in the Basque Country (Spain), having performed in the music & arts festivals Loraldia from Bilbao (Spain) and Quincena Musical de San Sebastián (Spain).
Léa Moullet is a violinist from Fribourg, at the French part of Switzerland.
As a classical musician and teacher, she completed her studies at the Zurich University of the Arts at the class of Ulrich Gröner and Sergey Malov. There, she had the chance to discover contemporary music, under the guidance of lecturers such as Lars Mlekusch, Martina Schucan and Rahel Cunz. Besides her studies, Léa has always performed a lot of music improvisation. As a student of Lucas Niggli, she gave master classes in free improvisation in Bangkok and Singapore as his assistant. She is a member of the Insub Meta Orchestra, the European orchestra for experimental and electroacoustic music, based in Switzerland.
Passionate about art in all its forms, Léa has directed several transdisciplinary projects. One of the last projects was the film "Le Son du Béton", which was filmed for the Le Corbusier Pavilion in Zurich.
In October 2020, Léa Moullet will start studying "Performance Practice in Contemporary Music" under the guidance of Klangforum Wien in Graz. Léa has worked with many composers, conductors and teachers, such as Matthias Pintscher, Helmut Lachenmann, Mark André, José Maria Sànchez-Verdù, William Blank, Simeon Pironkoff, Peter Rundel, Ernst Kovacic, Clemens Merkel, Rahel Cunz, and many others.
Leo Morello, cello
Leo Morello, born 1994 in Italy, studies Performance Practice in Contemporary Music with Klangforum Wien at the Kunstuniversität Graz. He graduated as a Bachelor of Arts from the Mozarteum University of Salzburg, where he studied cello with Enrico Bronzi. In 2017 he studied in the class of Stephan Forck at the Hanns Eisler Music Academy in Berlin. Very important for his formation were also the encounters with Antonio Meneses, Andreas Lindenbaum, Francesco Dillon, Marino Formenti, Reinhard Goebel.
He is a founding member of the New Art and Music Ensemble Salzburg, with whom he regularly performs in Europe. He also performed as a member of Klangforum Wien, Oenm Austrian Ensemble for New Music, WDR Sinfonieorchester, Maurice Quartet, Alter Ego Ensemble, International Ensemble Modern Academy, EUYO, Villa Musica Mainz and as principal cellist of the Orchestra del Teatro Comunale di Bologna.
His interest towards contemporary music led him to numerous collaborations with renowned composers like Enno Poppe, Georg Friedrich Haas, Bernhard Gander, Simon Steen-Andersen, Gerd Kühr, Achim Bornhöft, Reinhard Febel, Matteo
Franceschini, Jose Maria Sanchez Verdu, Jorge Sanchez Chiong, Klaus Lang, Marco Stroppa.
He performed at Abu Dhabi Festival, Sydney Opera House, Klangspuren Schwaz, Megaron Thessaloniki,
aDevangarde Festival, Daegu Contemporary Music Festival, Philarmony St. Petersburg, Impuls Festival Graz.
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