Sophie Heinrich is a German violinist, writer,
and teacher known for being the first female concertmaster of the Vienna
Symphony Orchestra (2019 to 2023.) Prior
to that engagement, she was the concertmaster of the Berlin Comic Opera
Orchestra (2012 to 2019.) The Berlin
Comic Opera Company produces operas, light operas, ballets, concerts, and
musicals and is known for being very innovative. She has also served as concertmaster in other
German orchestras, including the Bavarian Radio Orchestra, the Bavarian State
Opera (one of Carlos Kleiber’s favorite orchestras), and the Dresden State
Orchestra. Although she has concertized
and taught classes in the U.S., Asia, and South America, Heinrich’s career has
for the most part been spent in Europe. Her
webpage is easy to find on the internet.
She began her violin studies at age 4 but I don’t know who her first
teacher was. She later studied at the
Hanns Eisler school in Berlin with Antje Weithaas (Director of the Joseph
Joachim Violin Competition in Hanover); at the Lubeck University of Music (which
is about 150 miles northwest of Berlin) with Thomas Brandis (former
concertmaster of the Berlin Philharmonic and pupil of Max Rostal); and received
additional instruction from Reinhard Goebel (at Austria’s Mozarteum), Lothar
Strauss (concertmaster of the State Orchestra of Berlin), Gidon Kremer, Midori,
and the Artemis String Quartet. For a
time (approximately 2010 to 2017), she was Thomas Brandis’ assistant in
Lubeck. Heinrich has won top prizes at
various violin competitions, including the Leopold Mozart competition in 1999, and
the Max Rostal Competition in 2002. She
was awarded the Possehl Music Prize in Lubeck in 2008. Besides concertizing as a soloist and chamber
music player, Heinrich currently teaches at a private music school in
Feldkirch, Germany, the Stella Vorarlberg Private University. She is also the leader of the string section
at the Grafenegg Academy, located about thirty miles from Vienna. The Academy takes place during the summer at
Grafenegg Castle and involves classes in various disciplines in music. It is open (via audition) to young musicians
from all over the world. Heinrich’s
emphasis in teaching is the encouragement of female leadership. She is, as are most violinists, fluent in
three languages. She has said that her
Bible is Bach, her soul is Haydn (and Mozart), and her passion is Tango. (Incidentally, other classical violinists who
love dancing are: Tai Murray, Maxim Vengerov, Stefan Milenkovich, Rusanda
Panfili, and Andrew Sords. Violinists
from the past who, in addition to being musicians were also professional
dancers, are Jean Marie Leclair and Joseph de Bologne.) Here is one of Heinrich’s YouTube videos of a
recent concert featuring the popular Mozart Turkish concerto. Heinrich has played a Stradivari violin from
1698, a G.B. Guadagnini from 1753, and a modern violin by David Bague, a
well-known luthier from Barcelona.
(Leonidas Kavakos and Ruggiero Ricci also own violins by this violin
maker. Bague has said that he aspires to
create instruments to which nobody can be indifferent, which I think is a very
noble attitude toward his craft.)
