Interpretation Course for Lute and Plucked Instruments
Hopkinson Smith
Target Groups: Music students & players of lute, guitar, and other plucked instruments
Languages: English, German, French
Course location: Chesa da Cultura, Via Dimlej 44, CH-7500 St. Moritz
Master Class for Plucked Instruments with Hopkinson Smith (Lute)
In addition to his concert activities as a lutenist, Hopkinson Smith also is a teacher. His technical, instrumental, and musical musical skills, which he teaches in master classes all over the world, are highly appreciated by talented young musicians. His experience as a lutenist of early music as well as the realization of musical ideas are the focus of his seminar. The lessons focus on the experience of listening as well as technique and interpretation. Listeners may also participate in the seminar. The works dealt with will be performed on September 11th, 2022, at 11 a.m. in a matinée concert. Hopkinson Smith will be present as Artist-in-Residence at Chesa da Cultura throughout the entire week. The master class will begin on September 4th, 2022, at 6 p.m. with a joint dinner.
Hopkinson Smith, born in New York in 1946, is considered a leading figure in the field of early music and enjoys an international reputation as a lutenist. He studied Musicology in Harvard, graduating with honours in 1972. He then came to Europe, where he studied with Emilio Pujol in Catalonia, a great pedagogue in the nineteenth-century tradition. He then came to Switzerland to study the lute with Eugen M Dombois at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis. The triad of musical style, musical realization, and the instrument of Eugen M Dombois continue to influence Hopkinson Smith to this day. In addition to his work with many chamber-music orchestras, he was co-founder of the Ensemble Hesperion XX in 1974; his ten years of working with gambist Jordi Savall was to shape his chamber-music experience. Since 1976, Hopkinson Smith has been teaching at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, initially alongside Eugen M Dombois and from 1996 as his successor. From the mid-1980s, he focused on the solo repertoire for historical plucked instruments. His many award-winning solo recordings on various plucked instruments cover a wide range of Renaissance and Baroque styles. His arrangements of Bach’s Sonatas and Partitas for Violin and the Suites for Violoncello for the lute are of great importance. In 2007 and 2009, he moreover gave concerts and classes in Palestine under the auspices of Barenboim-Said Foundation.