Since her solo debut at thirteen, Mirjam Tschopp (born in Zurich/Switzerland in 1976) has enjoyed a versatile international career, both as violinist and viola player. In doing so, the two instruments are of equal importance in her activities.
As a soloist, she performed with such orchestras as the WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne, the Dresden Philharmony, the Berlin Symphonics, the Camerata St. Petersburg, the Mecklenburgische Staatskapelle, the Brandenburg State Orchestra, the Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz, the Orquesta Sinfonica Nacional Argentina, the Turkish Presidential Orchestra, the Zurich Chamber Orchestra, the Suk Chamber Orchestra Prague and the Festival Strings Lucerne.
She has also made a name for herself in chamber music – e.g. in ensembles with Anne-Sophie Mutter, Josef Suk, Ana Chumachenco, Peter-Lukas Graf, Boris Slutsky and Julian Milkis.
She has performed in London‘s Wigmore Hall, New York’s Kosciuszko Foundation, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, Cologne’s Philharmony, Hamburg‘s Grosse Musikhalle, St. Petersburg’s Glazunov Hall, the Prague Rudolfinum, the Teatro Filarmonico Verona, the Finlandia Concert Hall Helsinki, the Zurich Tonhalle, at festivals in Lucerne, Gstaad, Lyon and Davos, and in Paris and Buenos Aires. Between 1994 and 1998 she took part in many TV productions directed by Adrian Marthaler.
Her main focus of interest is the music of the past hundred years. She works closely with living composers, and has premiered numerous works, many of them dedicated to her or written for her. In 2003, she premiered with great success in Cologne the 3rd violin concerto by Nicolas Bacri, especially written for her, with the WDR Symphony conducted by Semyon Bychkov. In 2005, her recording of the violin concerto of Turkish composer Ahmet Adnan Saygun has been released by the label cpo and got excellent reviews. In 2007, the year of Saygun’s 100th birthday, her recording of Saygun’s viola concerto will be released.
Mirjam Tschopp was sole prizewinner of the Max Rostal Competition for viola 2000 in Berlin, a prizewinner of the 2006 Curci Violin Competition in Naples, and a finalist of the “Concert Artists Guild International Competition“ in New York. She won the “Swiss Ambassador‘s Award 2001“, study grants from the Kiefer Hablitzel Foundation and the Migros Cultural Foundation, and twice first prize at the Swiss Youth Music Competition. In 1994, she was Swiss finalist at the Concours Eurovision. Mirjam Tschopp was given a special grant by the “Anne-Sophie Mutter Circle of Friends Foundation“.
She began learning the violin at seven, and the viola five years later. She studied violin with Aïda Stucki Piraccini and Franco Gulli, and viola with Christoph Schiller. She also took part in several masterclasses with Thornas Brandis, Herman Krebbers and Rainer Kussmaul. In 1997, just one year after her linguistic matriculation, she obtained her teaching and concert diplomas, followed in 1999 by the soloist's diploma, all three with distinction.
Mirjam Tschopp is teaching at the “Summit Music Festival” in New York, the “International Academy of Music” in Castelnuovo di Garfagnana/Italy and the “Jeunesse Moderne” in Avignon/France. She is a Jury member of the Swiss Youth Music Competition.
05-07
