Veronika Eberle Vilde Frang Sergey Khachatryan Jaime Laredo Viktoria Mullova Julian Rachlin Alexandra Soumm Thomas Zehetmair

Vilde Frang

Video

Introduction

"It has only been a question of time before the next magic Miss Violin would announce herself. Here she is. Vilde Frang is the name of the delicate young lady from the far North, who has the promise of going all the way to the top."
Stuttgarter Zeitung, 11 April 2008

Since she was engaged by Mariss Jansons at the age of twelve to debut with the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra, Vilde Frang has established a reputation as one of the most promising young soloists to emerge from Scandinavia in recent years.

Highlights among her recent and forthcoming engagements include performances with the Hallè Orchestra, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Czech Philharmonic, WDR Cologne, Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich, Konzerthausorchester Berlin, the NHK Symphony in Tokyo and tours with BBC Philharmonic and Prague Philharmonia, with conductors including Alexander Lazarev, Andrew Manze, Ion Marin, Adam Fischer, Dennis Russell Davies, David Zinman, Vassily Sinaisky and Gianandrea Noseda.

She appears as a recitalist and chamber musician at international festivals in Schleswig-Holstein, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Schloßfestspiele Ludwigsburg, Braunschweig Classix, Bad Kissingen, Rheingau, Cheltenham, Verbier and Lucerne. Amongst her collaborators were Gidon Kremer and Yuri Bashmet at the Chamber Music Connects the World Festival and Martha Argerich, Renaud and Gautier Capucon at the Chambery Festival, and Leif Ove Andsnes and Truls Mörk in her home country. In 2007 and 2008, she joined Anne-Sophie Mutter on tours in Europe and the US, playing Bach's Double Concerto with Camerata Salzburg.

In 2007, Vilde Frang made her debut with London Philharmonic Orchestra and was immediately re-engaged for a concert with the orchestra and its principal conductor, Vladimir Jurowski at the Royal Festival Hall in the 2009 season. This was followed by an acclaimed debut recital at Wigmore Hall.

Born in Oslo in August 1986, Vilde studied at the Barratt Due Music Institute in Oslo and with Kolja Blacher at the Musikhochschule Hamburg. She is recipient of several awards, including Danish Queen Ingrid's Honorary Award, the Sonning Music Fund, Grand Prize of the Ritter Stiftung Hamburg and a Borletti-Buitoni Fellowship.

Vilde Frang is EMI Classics' Young Artist of the Year 2010. Her debut recording, featuring violin concertos by Sibelius and Prokofiev, was greeted with acclaim by critics throughout the world and was named Best Classical Release in the Norwegian Grammys.

Biography

Please contact Terry Shew for a current biography.

Press Reviews

"Vilde Frang plays as though the inner soul of Sibelius's music is being revealed for the very first time ... What makes this recording so special is not so much Frang's seductive, sinewy yet voluptuous tone, nor her effortless technical mastery; it is her startling emotional sincerity and inspired musical imagination that rivet the attention ... A luminously engineered disc that is surely bound for classic status"
THE STRAD

"Vilde Frang, who is going to be very big, indeed ... opens Sibelius with the iciest wisp of evanescent sound, announcing a major new force on the strings front. In the first Prokofiev concerto she substitutes flash virtuosity for an in- your-ear whisper. In Sibelius, she is fire on ice. Frang is my hot tip for 2010"
NORMAN LEBRECHT in "THE LEBRECHT REPORT"

"Ushering in the Sibelius with a sweetly tremulous whisper, Frang heralds one of the freshest and most vital accounts of this familiar and frequently recorded work in recent years ... The Prokofiev is no less vividly realised, Frang capturing its big-boned, muscular lyricism, animated whimsy and romantic abandon with deceptive ease and a maturity that makes one eager to hear more from this fine player"
BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE

"Norwegian violinist Vilde Frang's first CD is a cracker. Not yet 22, she has the full measure of Sibelius's Concerto and the couplings she has chosen, Prokofiev's First Violin Concerto and three of Sibelius's Humoresques, may well appeal to even the jaded fiddle fans ... More please!"
TULLY POTTER in DAILY MAIL

"....a fully fledged violinist with full control of technique, surplus and an incredible joy of interpretation"
AFTENPOSTEN (Oslo)

"The very peculiar thing about Vilde Frang is not her sound or her brilliant instrument but the tremendous musical expression she puts into every phrase"
SVENSKA DAGBLADET (Stockholm)

"Vilde Frang... unites breathless technique with an expansive and extremely expressive way of playing... Quite involuntarily Leif Ove Andsnes' depths of sound come to mind. Vilde Frang is a musician of same calibre"
GOTHENBURG-POSTEN

"The Norwegian-born Vilde Frang ticks all the right boxes to create a highly successful concert career at a time when the world is oversubscribed with technically brilliant young violinists" YORKSHIRE POST

"Bow and bowing arm were raised high in the air, only making physically visible the depth of feeling already embedded in her rounded tones, strong attack and mastery of the singing line. She bewitched within seconds... With her heart, soul and penetrating technique, she is definitely a violinist to look out for"
THE TIMES

"...Not only does she master it all technically, but it is how she uses her technique, as though the violin was a human voice, she speaks with her violin, catches impressions and shapes the sound. There is nothing polished and calculated in her playing, everything is displayed and it matches the style to perfection"
STUTTGARTER ZEITUNG

"So young and so gifted. Violinist Vilde Frang revealed herself as an astoundingly expressive musical interpreter. In contrast to many of her piers who are marketed as stars and hailed as such, Vilde Frang is far more than a promising talent. Above all the passionate, expressive music seems to run in the blood of this young Oslo girl. ...Vilde Frang excited the audience with her youthful exuberance, mastering technical difficulties and displaying a glowing intensity" LUDWIGSBURGER KREISZEITUNG

"Vilde Frang lit up the Royal Festival Hall with her confident, natural playing. ...Her virtuosity was fully equal to Ravel's Tzigane"
THE STRAD

"Vilde Frang gave a reserved and ego-free interpretation of Vaughan Williams' The Lark Ascending; the misty sounds she magically conjured added to the mystery of the music; this was playing of fluidity and lightness to create the sensation of a bird in flight. Frang hypnotised the audience (the Royal Festival Hall was packed) and then changed mood and tone for Ravel's Tzigane, an acidic, rugged and black-humoured display" CLASSICAL SOURCE

"One is tempted already at this early stage to use the term unique violinist of Vilde Frang, who comes from the same talent factory as Julia Fischer, who without fear or pretentions conquered all traps and hurdles in Lalo's Symphonie Espagnole. With this piece the young Norwegian deservedly made her highly successful debut in Großen Festspielhaus in Salzburg, where she brilliantly put her mark: full temperament and at the same time controlled virtuosity. With Paganini's La Molinara as encore she delighted the audience to standing ovations" DREHPUNKT KULTUR SALZBURG

"Vilde Frang mastered the performance with such ease that many highly praised names on the world music scene could envy her. Her playing is truly expressive, each tone is shaped crystally clear, and her greatest quality is her ability to shape the musical phrases and thus show her outstanding musicality. In this way the full potential in the music is unearthed"
VIESNIC (Zagreb)

"...The young violinist is one of the favourites you most of all want to hear- perhaps because she gives it all. One never tires of seeing the Norwegian standing in front of the Copenhagen Philharmonic. So likable. So present. So close to normality. Thank you for listening. Almost unbelievably she also belongs to the very best. Not only does she leave her listeners deeply touched - she shows all sides of herself - both her nervousness and her dexterity. And because the music itself could not find a better interpreter. Take her flair for colours, drama and changing moods... In this she even reminds one of the young Anne-Sophie Mutter" BERLINGSKE TIDENDE (Copenhagen)

"The Norwegian violin wonder Vilde Frang made a marvellous Musikverein debut with a piece by Lalo. ...Her convincing musical maturity coupled with a youthful effortlessness makes up the magic potion with which Vilde Frang enticed her audience. ...The lightness in her virtuoso technique left her audience breathless and the stage presence was moving" KRONENZEITUNG (Graz)

"Vilde Frang's career leaps forward in Lucerne. ...One listens to her technical abilities, but above all one is taken with her clear perception of the music. She is a violinist with such fine qualities and one will certainly hear more of her in the future"
NEUE LUZERNER ZEITUNG

"The highlight was the first appearance with the LPO of the 21 year old Norwegian violinist, Vilde Frang. Her performance of the Bruch Violin Concerto was nothing short of awesome. The applause at the end must have raised the rafters. ...Thank you Miss Frang, Carl Davis and the London Philharmonic Orchestra for such a start to the new season"
EASTBOURNE HERALD

"...When the Norwegian violin princess launched the fuga from Bartok Solo Sonata at us, one forgot the warm energy from the previous Schubert Sonata. Even though she in the Scherzo in this sonata showed bite and life. But as the 21 year old threw herself into the three part fuga with bristling brightness, followed by the "melodia" as a dialectic counterpart with a mediator's softness, one knew that one here had a master... The Prokofiev D Major Sonata provided us with a stirring and intense closing of the evening"
SÜD-DEUTSCHE ZEITUNG

"Norwegian Vilde Frang is such a powerful talent, that her mentor Anne-Sophie Mutter has to watch out. Or one might claim that Vilde Frang already has found her own space. Although she plays with tremendous surplus, she prefers taking chances rather than playing it safe. She explores every corner of the music and adds to its poetic drama, and she draws her fellow musicians with her in first one direction, then another... One does not need to expect less from a concert. If Vilde Frang fulfils the promises she so convincingly has given us already, she will be worth hearing no matter what she plays for many years to come" JYLLANDSPOSTEN (Copenhagen)

"The fireworks sparkled between Anne-Sophie Mutter and Vilde Frang in Bach's double Concerto for two violins; an enticing atmosphere already from the start. Vilde Frang really showed that she can hold her own in company with one of the greatest"
VG (Oslo)

"Vilde Frang is more than a virtuoso violinist. She is a great and rare artist [...] not only fantastically unrestrained by Bartók's tremendous technical challenges; she is also equal to the work's musical complexity and magnitude. The effect is never a goal in itself, and it is no aim for Vilde Frang to boast with her skills: She can do what she wants, and she wants more than most; but what she wants is completely shaped by an insightful respect for the work"
POLITIKEN (Copenhagen)

"The highlight of the evening was the appearance by the Norwegian violinist Vilde Frang, who gave simply astonishing performances of Saint Saëns's Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso and Sarasate's Zigeunerweisen [...] mark my words, this young lady's name will soon be on CDs in every classical record collection in the world"
MUSICAL OPINION