The Trio Chimera, winner of the Special Prize of the Embassy of Italy and the #IICAddisAbeba as the best Italian ensemble at the 2nd Filippo Nicosia International Award, will be in concert at the ICI with Special Guest of the evening is the famous violist Simone Gramaglia.
The Trio Chimera, formed by pianist Marta Ceretta, violinist Stefano Raccagni and cellist Giorgio Lucchini, was born in the late 2021 out of the desire of three friends to explore the repertoire for piano trio. Since 2021 the Trio has been attending the Master Specialized in Chamber Music at the Hochschule der Kunste in Bern, under the guidance of Patrick Juedt, and the Stauffer Center for Strings in Cremona with the Quartetto di Cremona. They also studied with Pierpaolo Maurizzi, Amiram Ganz, Ivan Rabaglia, Mischa Maisky and the Maisky Piano Trio, Antonio Valentino, Geneviève Strosser, Mark Messenger and Meret Lüthi.
In June 2022, the group is invited to the Vilnius session of the European Chamber Music Academy (ECMA), playing in the Palace of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania and studying with Avedis Kouyoumdjian, Imke Frank and Johannes Meissl. In July 2022 the Trio participated in the summer masterclass held by Clive Greensmith at the Accademia Chigiana in Siena, obtaining the Diploma of Merit. In December 2022, for the ECMA session in Bern, the ensemble works with Hatto Beyerle, Karla Haltenwanger, Ernesto Molinari, Minna Pensola and Louise Hopkins.
In winter 2021, the Trio is selected by Simone Gramaglia to become part of the Le Dimore del Quartetto network. In March 2022 they won second prize at the 26th G. Rospigliosi International Chamber Music Competition. In August 2022 they were awarded best Italian ensemble at the 2nd Filippo Nicosia International Chamber Music Competition in Faenza, winning two concerts for the Italian Cultural Institutes of Barcelona and Addis Abeba, and two for the Gioventù Musicale d’Italia.
In 2022 the ensemble performed in in Latina for the Campus Internazionale di Musica; in the Court of Palazzo Doria-Tursi in Genoa, for the Gems à la Paganini festival; at the Teatro degli Illuminati in Città di Castello, for the 55th Festival delle Nazioni. In October, in collaboration with the contemporary music ensemble AltreVoci, the trio plays in two concerts at the University of the Arts in Tirana.
Simone Gramaglia, viola
“Gramaglia is clearly the star, and his playing is hard to fault – intonation as well as interpretation. Violists will want this one[..]” American Record Guide, July/August 2015
“Excellent performances by violist Simone Gramaglia, a seasoned soloist and violist of the famous Quartetto di Cremona[..]” Prestoclassical UK.
“The deep, plush sound of Simone Gramaglia’s viola and his ardent playing constantly impressed” ConcertClassics NY – Lincoln Center concert review
A versatile instrumentalist and an intellectually curious artist, Simone Gramaglia is considered one of the finest violists of his generation.
He combines his passion for music, philosophy and literature with an intense activity as a musician (both in chamber music and as a soloist), as a teacher and as an artistic director.
His teachers were L. Brusini, M. Kugel, B. Giuranna and Y. Bashmet.
His studies with Piero Farulli and H. Beyerle were fundamental to his education in the art of chamber music.
He began studying the viola at the age of 16, after having previously studied the piano and recorder. He earned his diploma six years later, and immediately embarked on an international concert career.
As a founder member of the Quartetto di Cremona, founded in 2000, Gramaglia is passionately dedicated to chamber music and collaborates with numerous artists including Antonio Meneses, Lawrence Dutton, Miguel da Silva, Jamie Walton, Eckart Runge, Kyril Zlotnikov, Giovanni Sollima, Till Fellner, David Shifrin, the Pavel Haas String Quartet and the Emerson String Quartet, and performs in the most prestigious concert halls in the world (among others, Lincoln Center in New York, the Konzerthaus in Berlin, Wigmore Hall in London, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Santa Cecilia, NCPA Beijing, the Salle Gaveau in Paris, and the Teatro Colon in
Buenos Aires).
Since 2012 he has performed in a duo with guitarist Luigi Attademo, with whom he recently recorded an album dedicated to the works of Niccolò Paganini, which was very well received by critics. It included Gramaglia’s own transcriptions of the six Op. 2 sonatas, the famous Sonata Concertata and the original version of the Sonata per la Gran Viola, which he has also performed with numerous orchestras.
His chamber and solo repertoire ranges from Bach to the twentieth century, with a particular focus on the contemporary music of today.
He has recorded for the Decca, Audite (Echo Prize 2017, ICMA 2018) and Brilliant record labels, both as a soloist and with the Quartetto di Cremona.
His performances are regularly broadcast on major radio stations around the world (ABC, BBC, Rai Radio 3, Deutschland Radio, WQXR New York.)
He is a member of the faculty of the string quartet program at the Accademia Walter Stauffer in Cremona, as well as the viola and string quartet teacher at Music With Masters, a summer masterclass of which he is the founder and artistic director.
He is regularly invited to hold master classes across the globe.
In addition to his teaching activities, he is intensely dedicated to supporting young musicians, in particular young string quartets, string trios and piano quartet and trios, through the international initiative “Le Dimore del Quartetto.”
He serves as artistic director of the project and has selected over ninety young ensembles from all over the world as participants.
He is the artistic director of the Filippo Nicosia International Chamber Music Award and Masterclass.
He is regularly invited to sit on the juries of international string quartet and chamber music competitions (including the Premio Paolo Borciani, the Concorso Gianni Bergamo, Premio Trio di Trieste).
He has also served as a member of the viola and chamber music faculty at the Niccolò Paganini Conservatory of Music in Genoa, and Peri Conservatory of Music in Reggio Emilia.
At the moment he teaches Chamber Music for Strings at the Conservatory “N. Picconni” in Bari.
He plays a viola by G. Torazzi from circa 1680, generously made available to him by the Kulturfonds Peter Eckes (Germany.) He was the first and only Italian violist to play the Stradivarius “Paganini” viola for a prolonged period, kindly loaned to him by the Nippon Music Foundation (Tokyo).
He writes the column “L’Angolo del Quartetto” (Quartet Corner) for Archi magazine.
A recording for viola and guitar dedicated to Schubert music is going to be released in 2023.
