Sarah Rumer, flute

Sarah Rumer has been principal flute of the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande in Geneva since 2004. She studied in Zurich with Felix Dorigo and Günter Rumpel, later in Vienna with Dieter Flury, as well with Verena Piller and Rudolf Hartmann in her second major, singing. She has won prizes at various international competitions, including the Carl Nielsen Competition in Odense (DK), the Markneukirchen International Instrumental Competition (D) and the Kobe Flute Competition (J), where she was also awarded a special prize for her interpretation of Mozart, and has won the most important Swiss music competitions and scholarships. As a soloist, she has performed with the Ensemble Tokyo, the Orchestre de Chambre de Genève and the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande under Marek Janowski, Heinz Holliger and Jonathan Nott, among others. Chamber music concerts in various formations have taken her to the Lucerne and Verbier festivals, among others. Her teaching activities have become increasingly important in recent years: she has been a lecturer at the Lucerne University of Music since 2011, as well as a professor of various masterclasses in Portugal, Spain, Italy, Japan and Korea. She was a founding member of the Rheinau Masterclasses in 2012 and took over their artistic direction with Olivier Darbellay in 2023. Her CD recordings have been released by Prospero Classical and CPO. Numerous radio and television broadcasts document her activities.

www.sarahrumer.ch/de/

Simon Sommerhalder, oboe

Born in 1987, Swiss oboist Simon Sommerhalder studied with Adriano Mondini in Como, with Hans Elhorst in Lugano and in Lübeck under Diethelm Jonas. Already as a teenager, he performed internationally both as an oboist and playing the recorder.
He went on to receive an Echo Klassik award for his recording of Ponchielli's Capriccio di Amilcare in 2012.
Simon has been a member of Claudio Abbado's Mozart Orchestra in Bologna, the Orquestra de la Comunitat Valenciana under Lorin Maazel and Zubin Mehta, and the Orchestra of the National Academy of Santa Cecilia in Rome under Antonio Pappano. In 2008 he was appointed principal cor anglais of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra under Riccardo Chailly, and became a member of its wind quintet in 2016. Simon Sommenhalder joined the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande as principal oboe in 2020.

Mor Biron, bassoon

Former member of the world-renowned Berliner Philharmoniker, Mor began his musical journey playing the cello before starting bassoon lessons with Gad Lederman and Maurizio Paez. He holds a Bachelor’s degree from the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance and furthered his studies at the “Hanns Eisler” Hochschule für Musik in Berlin with Professors Klaus Thunemann and Volker Tessmann. He was a scholar of the Karajan-Akademie of the Berliner Philharmoniker.
As a scholar of the America-Israel Cultural Foundation, Mor won the 1st prize in the “Aviv” Competition in Tel Aviv and is a founding member of the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra under the baton of Daniel Barenboim, with whom he frequently performs.
Mor held the principal bassoon position at the opera house in Valencia before joining the Berliner Philharmoniker. He is an active chamber musician and member of Ensemble Berlin-Prag and the Boulez Ensemble. Following his passion for early music, Mor performs on historical instruments.
As a dedicated teacher and educator for bassoon and music, Mor spends much of his time offering master classes worldwide and working with young musicians. He was a teacher at the Karajan Academy of the Berliner Philharmoniker and is the leading professor for Bassoon at the Barenboim-Said Academy in Berlin. Mor is a professor at the Academy of Orchestral Studies in Sevilla and in 2022-2023 was “Artist in Residence” at the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance.
The art of performance and the inner voice are important values which Mor passes on to his students and colleagues.

Olivier Darbellay, french horn

was born in Bern and grew up in a musical family. He studied the cello at the Bern Conservatory with Patrick Demenga and Peter Hörr as well as the horn with Thomas Müller in Bern and Basel. He completed his horn studies with Bruno Schneider in Freiburg i.Br., graduating „with excellence“. Since his first prize at the „Tribune des Jeunes interprètes“ in 2000 in Lisbon, as well as being named „Soloist of the year 2000“ at the Union of French Radios Competition, he performs as a soloist and chamber musician in the most prestigious halls and festivals across Europe, North America and Asia.
Olivier Darbellay specialises as much in the historical repertoire performed on period instruments as well as in the contemporary repertoire, where he works closely with composers such as Holliger, Pauset, Gubler and Darbellay and regularly perfoms world premieres.
He plays principal horn with the Berne Symphony Orchestra, the Basel Chamber Orchestra and the Gstaad Festival Orchestra.
In addition to performing, Darbellay is a dedicated teacher, holding masterclasses and workshops across the world, as well as professorships at both the academies of Lucerne and Lausanne.

www.olivierdarbellay.com

Benjamin Engeli, piano

is one of the most versatile Swiss musicians of his generation. His career as a soloist, each week Benjamin Engeli commutes around 1000 kilometers by train for his many concerts, his teaching job at the Vorarlberger Landeskonservatorium in Feldkirch, his various Jury engagements and his commitment as a father of a four-year-old daughter. His versatility is also reflected in his impressive piano repertoire. As a soloist he appears with renowned orchestras such as the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra Moscow and the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich.
Benjamin is also a gifted chamber musician: as a member of the Tecchler Trio he won the 2007 ARD Music Competition, and is now appearing with the Ensemble Kandinsky and other musical partners in venues including the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Konzerthaus Berlin, Wigmore Hall London, Theatro Municipal do Rio de Janeiro, Shanghai Oriental Art Center and the Vienna Musikverein. As member of the Gershwin Piano Quartet he likes to cross musical borders and is also active as an arranger of music by many different composers, ranging from Johann Sebastian Bach to Michael Jackson. Engeli hails from a musical family and started his musical education on various instruments at an early age. He studied horn at first before eventually concentrating on his principal instrument, studying with Adrian Oetiker at the Musik-Akademie Basel. He undertook further studies with Homero Francesch, Lazar Berman, Andrzej Jasinski, Maurizio Pollini and Andràs Schiff.

www.benjaminengeli.com