Trio Echnaton

Wolfram Brandl, violin
Sebastian Krunnies, viola
Frank-Michael Guthmann, violoncello

Numbered today among the world’s foremost string trios, the Trio Echnaton is notable for its individual character and a melding of intellect and emotion in its musicianship. Founded in 1996, the ensemble very soon won numerous competitions, including the Deutscher Musikwettbewerb in Bonn and the International Joseph Joachim Chamber Music Competition in Weimar. The trio received important impulses as artists and as musicians from Martin Ostertag, Rainer Kussmaul, Kim Kashkashian and Wolfgang Boettcher. The membership of Trio Echnaton, with violinist Wolfram Brandl, has been unchanged for eight years. In 2002 the Trio won the Ensemble Prize at the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festival. For many years reckoned to belong to an established yet still up-and-coming generation, the Trio has meanwhile won a place among in the premiere league of ensembles that enliven the international chamber music scene with their intelligent, expressive and above all, imaginative playing.

The Trio Echnaton has performed in both the Philharmonie and the Konzerthaus, Berlin, the Herkulessaal in Munich, the Glocke in Bremen, as well as at such important festivals as the Rheingau Music Festival, Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festival, Dresden Music Festival, the Ludwigsburger Schlossfestspiele and the Mozartfest Würzburg. The ensemble has made guest appearances at La Folle Journée, Nantes/France and the Kuhmo Chamber Music Festival in Finland, also in China, Korea, Ethiopia, Russia, Poland, the Czech Republic, Macedonia, Austria and Ireland. In March 2010, the Trio will perform at Osterfestspiele Salzburg in the Mozarteum together with pianist Imogen Cooper. Next season the Trio Echnaton is touring Germany again, including a concert at Chamber Hall of Philharmonie Berlin.

Among Trio Echnaton’s partners have been Julia Fischer, Daniel Müller-Schott and Emmanuel Pahud, as well as Jonathan Gilad and Martin Stadtfeld.
In a co-production with Stuttgart Radio, just recently Coviello Classics released a recording of string trios by W. A. Mozart and Volker David Kirchner. Composed in 2000, Kirchner dedicated the latter to the Trio Echnaton. This recording received a Supersonic Award. Others of works for string trio by Martinu, Reger, Schnittke, as well as of Dimitry Sitkovetzky’s arrangement for string trio of J. S. Bach’s Goldberg Variations, are also available.

Wolfram Brandl is a member of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. Sebastian Krunnies – also a member of Berlin Philharmonic – and Frank-Michael Guthmann, first solo cellist with the SWR Baden-Baden and Freiburg Symphony Orchestra, are founder members of the Trio Echnaton.

December 2009