Concert for Peace - Berlin University of the Arts

The mezzo-soprano Marina Prudenskaya studied in her hometown of St. Petersburg. In 2003 she won first prize at the ARD Music Competition and subsequently developed a broad repertoire as an ensemble member at the Staatstheatre Nuremberg, the Deutsche Oper Berlin and the Stuttgart Opera. She has been a member of the ensemble of the Staatsoper Unter den Linden since 2013. Marina Prudenskaya has made guest appearances at renowned houses and festivals worldwide, including the Royal Opera House Covent Garden (Azucena/Il trovatore), Teatro Real de Madrid, Palau de les Arts in Valencia, Opernhaus Zürich (Gertrud u. Hexe/Hänsel und Gretel), Teatro Municipal de Santiago de Chile, Hessische Staatstheatre Wiesbaden (Preziosilla/La forza del destino), the Bavarian State Opera (Octavian/Der Rosenkavalier, 2016), Hamburg State Opera (Amneris/Aida), Nationaltheatre Mannheim (Eboli/Don Carlo), Opera Vlaanderen Antwerpen (Lady Macbeth/Macbeth) and Washington National Opera as well as the Bayreuth Festival (Fricka/Walküre, Waltraute/Götterdämmerung) and the Festival d'Aix-en-Provence.

Artistic vision and tireless cultural-political commitment: these are the qualities that have made Los Angeles-born American-Israeli conductor Steven Sloane known worldwide. A former student of Eugene Ormandy, Franco Ferrara and Gary Bertini, he made his mark early on on at festivals and opera houses such as the Spoleto Festival in Charleston and Opera North in Leeds. He also served as principal conductor of the American Composers Orchestra and the Stavanger Symphony Orchestra, as well as Artistic Director for the European Capital of Culture year RUHR.2010.

From 1994 to 2021, Steven Sloane was General Music Director of the Bochum Symphony Orchestra, which advanced to become one of Germany's leading orchestras under his leadership. Among his greatest achievements was the realization of the orchestra's own concert hall, the Anneliese Brost Musikforum Ruhr, which was successfully opened in 2016. Other extraordinary successes of his work with the Bochum Symphony included the exceptional production of Zimmermann's Die Soldaten at the Ruhrtriennale (2006) and at New York's Lincoln Center Festival (2008), the acclaimed Mahler/Ives cycle at the Philharmonie Essen, and numerous CD projects, including the complete recording of the orchestral works of Joseph Marx. As an honorary conductor, he remains closely associated with the orchestra and the city of Bochum.

The Kammerchor der Künste Berlin is formed by about 25 music students of the Berlin University of the Arts, mainly aspiring school and church musicians, vocal teachers and sound engineers, who make music together under the direction of Prof. Maike Bühle with a pronounced enthusiasm for detailed interpretations and for a stylistically variable, but always homogeneous choral sound. With concentration, dedication and passion, the choir works unanimously on the common expression and tries to go beyond itself in order to refine the sound even further and to get closer to the core of the compositions. The ensemble also plays and performs outside Germany on concert tours.

A variety of productions have already been created in collaboration with the Tonmeister*In programme at the UdK Berlin. There is also a close cooperation with the Department of Early Music of the UdK Berlin, among other things, J. S. Bach's motet "Der Geist hilft unser Schwachheit auf" has already been developed, performed and recorded together.

As one of the leading university orchestras in Germany, the Berlin University of the Arts Symphony Orchestra enriches the orchestral landscape of the capital city with three to four concerts each year, as well as an opera project. These include the traditional Concert for the Nations in the fall, a concert format that puts the internationality of the students of the Faculty of Music at the UdK Berlin in a celebratory setting and is held annually under the patronage of a Berlin-based ambassador. The opening concert of crescendo, the music festival of the UdK Berlin, is also usually performed by the Symphony Orchestra of the UdK Berlin. The orchestra also regularly performs chamber music with works from the 18th and early 19th centuries.