WHO WE ARE
JOHN AXELROD, CONDUCTOR
An exceptionally extensive repertoire, innovative programming, and a charismatic presence make John Axelrod today one of the most sought-after conductors in the world. In 2014, Maestro Axelrod became the new Artistic and Musical Director of the Real Orquesta Sinfónica de Sevilla and in 2020, Mr. Axelrod became the Principal Guest Conductor of the Kyoto City Symphony Orchestra.
In addition to this, John Axelrod has also held the positions of Principal Guest Conductor of the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano "Giuseppe Verdi", Music Director of the Orchestre National des Pays de la Loire, Music Director and Chief Conductor of the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra and Theater, and Music Director of the
“Hollywood in Vienna” Concerts, with the
Symphony Orchestra of Radio ORF Vienna.
Mr. Axelrod graduated in 1988
from Harvard University.
He also studied alongside Leonard Bernstein,
as well as at the St. Petersburg Conservatory in the class of Ilya Musin in 1996-1997.
MATHIEU BRUNO, CHEF
Mathieu Bruno Chef and manager of Là-Haut. Mathieu Bruno,
recently awarded the 1st Swiss culinary merit and holder of Gault & Millau distinctions, was born in Montreux in 1983, and has a wealth of experience with many recognized and starred chefs of French gastronomy, including Alain Carro and M. Chibrac, Patrick Zimmerman, Julien Retler, Denis Martin, Philippe Blondiaux, etc. ..
This curious and creative gourmet confirms his gastronomic orientation towards authenticity, the subtlety of unexpected combinations and the freshness of seasonal products.
From 2012 to 2015, he was cook and manager at the Paysan Horloger space in Boechet in the Jura. and awarded the “Découverte romande”
by Gault & Millau.
2016 was the opening of La-Haut in Chardonne.
L'ORCHESTRE INTERNATIONAL DE GENÈVE
The OIG, founded in 2010 by Dominique Föllmi, is celebrating its tenth anniversary this year. This innovative and original ensemble is not intended to evolve into a “classic” institutional structure, with a permanent head.
It is above all a creative entity with variable geometry, arranged according to the works presented, audiences, partners and places.
This orchestra is made up of talented professional musicians of different nationalities, all members of renowned orchestras. They are united for each concert around the same humanist ideal, making music a privileged vector of dialogue between cultures. This spirit gives its coherence and its personality to this beautiful orchestra.
SOLOISTS
TEODORA GHEORGHIU
Sometimes a singer’s destiny catches up with them. For the Romanian soprano Teodora Gheorghiu that moment occured courtesy of Jose Carreras, at the Julian Gayarre International Singing Competition. She had not won and Carreras, who was on the jury that year, was outraged. He approached her and told her that in his opinion she had deserved the prize, and insisted on giving her a scholarship equivalent to the prize money, from his own pocket. To have such a great tenor make such a gesture
meant the world to the young soprano.
“It was the first time that someone had told me I had a future as a singer”, she says. Her path was set.
But artistic destiny is usually rooted in nature. To this day she often feels singing to be a spiritual act
– “it starts in the very core of you and pours out”.
After a series of Music competition prizes – among which notably the Queen Elisabeth Competition – and having won the Herbert von Karajan scholarship, she made her debut at the Vienna Staatsoper, still only 25 years old, and joined the company as a principal artist from 2007-‐2010. In Vienna she sang a wide array of leading roles, including Adele (Die Fledermaus), the Queen of the Night (Die Zauberflöte), Nanetta (Falstaff), Fiakermilli (Arabella), Adina (L’Elisir d’Amore),
Elvira (L’Italiana in Algeri), Sophie (Werther), and Eudoxie (La Juive).
She describes the experience of singing in the top flight and working with such top-‐flight colleagues as Juan Diego Florez, Neil Shicoff, Leo Nucci, Ramon Vargas, Seiji Ozawa, Adam Fischer, Marco Armiliato, Bertrand de Billy and Franz Welser-‐Möst among others now in one word, “joy”. Soon the bel canto soprano was by being recognised as one of the world’s most exciting young talents.
When she decided to leave Vienna in 2010, this time to spread her wings for a freelance career, conductor Christophe Rousset approached her with an idea for her first recording, an homage to the 18th-‐century soprano Anna De Amicis. The resulting album, on the Harmonia Mundi-‐distributed Aparté label, included mostly premiere recordings of arias by Mozart, Gluck, Borghi, Cafaro and Mysliveček and was named “Disc of the Month” by International Record Review (which praised Gheorghiu’s “stunning vocalism”) and by Opera magazine, and was BBC Radio Three’s “Disc of the Week” for 3 consecutive weeks.
With all this success, her approach to her art is about as far from the stereotypical bel canto diva’s as it is possible to get. “I will always try to be an honest artist, to serve the art, not the opposite,”
says Gheorghiu, “I don’t want to put myself in the middle.”
Thus, one can understand very well that Teodora Gheorghiu’s love of music and singing is not limited to opera alone. Many times throughout her career she has given Lieder recitals. In 2013 she released her second Album Art Nouveau featuring Lieder by Strauss, Zemlinsky, Ravel and Respighi as exemplary expressions of this European Jugendstil Art movement in music.
Just as all people do change and develop constantly throughout their lives, the artist in particular undergoes a continuous process of maturing. In the case of a singer such a process is also reflected in his voice. Already this summer, while still celebrating her latest success in the role of Sophie (Der Rosenkavalier by Richard Strauss) at the Glyndebourne Festival, an important development had announced itself in Teodora Gheorghiu’s voice which in the meantime has now turned into a more concrete shape,
and which artistically speaking opens her new horizons.
After all these years of experience in the field of a lyric coloratura soprano as well as in the Bel-‐Canto repertoire, the change of vocal Fach allows her henceforth to interpret a series of fascinating new roles which she had never hoped for. In December 2014, she made her debut in the role of
Puccini’s Mimì (La Bohème). In May 2015, she interpreted the Countess in Mozart’s The Mariage of Figaro on a Tour through Japan. In January 2019, Teodora Gheorghiu performed the New Year's program in Sevilla,
under the baton of John Axelrod.
THE HEAVENLY LIFE WITH LUCIA MARTIN CARTON: DECEMBER 19, 2020- RESCHEDULED DUE TO CORONAVIRUS CONDITIONS - DATE TO BE DETERMINED
Just in time for the holidays to eat, drink and be musical and merry with the family, come experience The Heavenly Life, featuring Spanish soprano, Lucía Martín-Cartón, in a performance of Mahler's Symphony 4, Wagner's Siegfried Idyll, and two versions of sleigh bells by the Mozart family, Leopold and Wolfgang.
PAST PROGRAM: THE SERENADE OF SEASONS WITH ALEXANDRA CONUNOVA: SEPTEMBER 26, 2020
Prize winner of the Tchaikovsky Competition and known throughout the world, for her virtuosity and passion, Alexandra Conunova delighted audiences at the 1st Concerts Culinaires de Chardonne in a program of Vivaldi's Four Seasons, The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires by Astor Piazzolla. The International Orchestra of Geneva performed Tchaikovsky's Serenade for Strings, under the baton of John Axelrod.