Sophie-Mayuko Vetter, Hamburg Symphony & Peter Ruzicka
Biography Sophie-Mayuko Vetter, Hamburg Symphony & Peter Ruzicka
Sophie-Mayuko Vetter
has been praised as an artist of extraordinary expressivity and versatility by press and colleagues alike. She has been performing since an early age in the world’s renowned concert halls, including the Alte Oper Frankfurt, Philharmony Essen, Liederhalle Stuttgart, Felsenreitschule (Salzburg Festival), Church of St. Martin-in-the-Fields (London), Opera City Hall (Tokyo), and many others.
Since her CD recording debut at age 14 with the 24 Chopin Preludes as a recipient of the Parke-Davis Prize, Ms. Vetter has been widely recorded by the major European and Asian radio broadcasters and tv stations.
Having performed at some of the most prestigious European festivals in recent years (including the Salzburg Festival, Munich Biennale, Albert Konzerte, Klavierfestival Ruhr, Bad Kissinger Musiksommer), Ms. Vetter currently looks forward to performances, master classes for piano students and recordings in Asia and Europe.
Ms. Vetter’s repertoire ranges from early Baroque to Contemporary, and she infuses her interpretations of each epoch with their own unique stylistic requirements. She also performs much of the 18th and 19th century repertoire on the fortepiano, which lends her interpretations of the same repertoire on the modern piano a distinctly fresh and historic touch, including improvisation and ornamentation. She extends aspects of period performance practice to her long-time chamber music collaboration with Rainer Kussmaul, former concertmaster of the Berlin Philharmonic.
Sophie-Mayuko Vetter has long been a champion of Contemporary Music. Her close work with luminaries such as Karlheinz Stockhausen, Claus-Steffen Mahnkopf, Peter Ruzicka and Henri Pousseur has included numerous performances of their compositions under their guidance. Ms. Vetter gave the premiere of Stockhausen’s seminal work “Spiral” (her own solo piano version) in 1999; Mr. Mahnkopf dedicated her among others his piano concerto “Prospero’s Epilogue”, which she premiered at the Salzburg Festival in 2005 with the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra.
In 2007, Ms. Vetter premiered and recorded Mr. Pousseur’s piano work “Paravent of an Old Monk,” of which she is the dedicatee, in Belgium and Japan; the CD was released in 2008. In 2010, her CD recording with the complete piano works of Peter Ruzicka was released, as well as some months later her Schumann recording. The August (2011) issue of the renowed magazine for classical music “Fono Forum” dedicated her a large-scale portrait article and a live CD of her concert at the Klavierfestival Ruhr 2010 with works by Handel, Bach, Haydn, Chopin and Ruzicka. CDs with piano works by C.P.E. Bach and Brahms are in preparation.
During the last season 2010/2011, she was soloist in concerts with the Aachen Symphony Orchestra, Philharmony of Nations, Düsseldorf Symphony Orchestra, Kollegium Winterthur and others.
Sophie-Mayuko Vetter is also active in the area of musicology. She contributes articles regularly to Germany’s Music and Aesthetics, among other leading publications.
Sophie-Mayuko Vetter was born in Sapporo, Japan. She began to study piano, violin and composition at age 4; she moved with her family to Germany two years later. Her father, Michael Vetter, was as her mentor in overtone singing a major influence in her early musical development. Their touring as a vocal duo until 1996 helped shape her musical aesthetics on the piano.
Sophie-Mayuko Vetter received her Masters of Music at the University of Music Freiburg, where she studied piano with Edith Picht-Axenfeld and Vitaly Margulis, period performance practice with Robert Hill, and musicology with Claus-Steffen Mahnkopf. Her studies with Peter Feuchtwanger in London were another strong influence.
