| Christoph Koncz | |
| Birth Date: | 3 September 1987 |
| Birth Place: | Konstanz, West Germany |
| Genre: | Classical |
| Occupation: | Violinist, Conductor |
| Years Active: | 1993–present |
| Website: | christophkoncz.com |
Christoph Koncz (born September 3, 1987, in Konstanz) is an Austrian-Hungarian conductor, performing internationally with orchestras such as the London Symphony Orchestra, Orchester der Wiener Staatsoper, Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Orchestre Métropolitain de Montréal and Hong Kong Philharmonic.
He has started his tenure as Music Director of the Orchestre symphonique de Mulhouse in September 2023 and is currently in his fifth season as Chief Conductor of the Deutsche Kammerakademie Neuss am Rhein. He has also enjoyed a close relationship with the Verbier Festival Chamber Orchestra and the renowned French period instrument ensemble Les Musiciens du Louvre.
Originally active as a violinist, Christoph Koncz was appointed principal second violin of the Vienna Philharmonic aged twenty in 2008, a position he has held until August 2023.[1] At the age of just nine, he received worldwide acclaim for starring as child prodigy Kaspar Weiss in the Canadian feature film The Red Violin, which won the 1999 Academy Award for Best Original Score.[2]
Born in 1987 in Konstanz into an Austrian-Hungarian family of musicians, Christoph Koncz received his first violin lesson at the age of four and entered the Vienna University of Music only two years later, studying with Eugenia Polatschek. He went on to study violin with Josef Hell, Igor Ozim and Boris Kuschnir at the Music Universities of Vienna, Salzburg and Graz as well as conducting with Mark Stringer in Vienna. Master classes with Daniel Barenboim, Daniel Harding and David Zinman further enriched his musical education.
Christoph Koncz made his North American debut as a soloist aged twelve with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra conducted by Charles Dutoit, leading to collaborations with conductors such as Sir Neville Marriner, Dmitry Sitkovetsky, Gábor Takács-Nagy and Marc Minkowski. Further engagements have taken him to numerous countries across Europe and to the Middle East, Asia and Australia as well as North and South America.
Much in demand as a chamber musician, Christoph Koncz's musical partners include Leonidas Kavakos, Joshua Bell, Vilde Frang, Renaud Capuçon, Antoine Tamestit, Kim Kashkashian, Gautier Capuçon, Nicolas Altstaedt and Rudolf Buchbinder. He also performs frequently with his brother Stephan Koncz, a sought-after cellist and member of the Berlin Philharmonic. They are both recipients of the European Music Prize for Youth.
Christoph Koncz is particularly noted for his interpretations of the works by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. His recording of the Complete Violin Concertos as soloist and conductor with Les Musiciens du Louvre was released by Sony Classical in 2020 under the title Mozart's Violin and caused an international sensation for being the first recording of these famous works on the composer's original Baroque violin. The Strad magazine described Koncz's performance as ‘a masterly demonstration of melodic playing’.
Christoph Koncz performs on the "Brüstlein" Stradivarius of 1707 on generous loan by the National Bank of Austria.
His conducting debut at the 2013 Salzburg Mozartwoche was followed by concerts at such prestigious venues as the Berlin, Cologne, Hamburg and Munich Philharmonie, Vienna Musikverein and Konzerthaus, KKL Lucerne and Concertgebouw Amsterdam as well as at the Salzburg Festival.
During the 2023/24 season, Christoph Koncz will appear for the first time with the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden, Orchestre de Paris, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and Orquestra Sinfônica do Estado de São Paulo. He will also conduct performance series of Don Giovanni at the National Theatre Prague and Rigoletto at the Teatro Real Madrid. He will return to the hr‑Sinfonieorchester Frankfurt, Orquesta Sinfónica de Castilla y León, Aarhus Symphony Orchestra and Orchestra Ensemble Kanazawa and make further debuts with the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Orquestra Simfónica de les Illes Balears und at the Tsinandali Festival, Armenian National Philharmonic Orchestra.