Guests
Our guests work with us temporarly on different projects and programs.
Brian Franklin - Viols
The US-born viola da gamba player Brian Franklin grew up in Toronto, Canada where he first became acquainted with the instrument and its repertoire and came to Basel in 1977 to study with Jordi Savall at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis. He completed his studies there in 1982 and since 1983 has been teaching in Zurich at the Universtiy of the Arts and the municipal music school and conservatory.
Over the years he has performed internationally with a variety of ensembles, with emphasis in recent years on Renaissance music with “Canti B“ and “Ensemble Daedalus“ and the vast repertoire of music of the 16th and 17th centuries for viol consort with “Concerto di Viole“, “Cellini Consort“ and “Marais Consort“. Various CDs document the work of these goups.
For over 20 years he performed regularly in Zurich and Basel in concerts contrasting early music with contemporary music for early instruments with “Ensemble Aspecte“ (recorder, viol and harpsichord/organ), including first performances of commissioned works.
Christoph Prendl - Viols
Christoph Prendl studied harpsichord with Brett Leighton and Viola da Gamba with Claire Pottinger at the Bruckner-Universität Linz in Austria. He continued to study the Viola da Gamba and early string instruments with Paolo Pandolfo and Randall Cook at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, where he completed a Master of Arts in 2011. In the same year he was awarded a special prize at the Telemann- competition in Magdeburg (Germany) for the best improvised ornamentation. In 2012 he completed a master degree in music theory. He gave concerts at the „Innsbrucker Festwochen der Alten Musik“, at the festival Oude Muziek in Utrecht, at the „Telemann-Festtage Magdeburg“, on the instruments of A. Beurmann’s famous collection of historical harpsichords at the „Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe“ in Hamburg and in the Bach House in Eisenach. He is currently writing a PhD thesis at Würzburg University on austrian music theory in the 17th century. Furthermore, he is teaching music theory at the academy of music in Mannheim and Trossingen (Germany).
Agnes Waibel - Voice
Agnes Waibel received her first musical impressions very early as she grew up in a musical family in the south of Germany. After learning to play the recorder, she won several national competitions as a young player. In 2004 she entered the "Hochschule für Musik" in Freiburg (Germany) where she studied recorder with Agnes Dorwarth and Michael Form. In 2008 she finished her studies with a successful diploma. The same year she entered the "Schola Cantorum Basiliensis" in Basel (Switzerland) as a singer and started having lessons in the class of Rosa Dominguez. In 2011, after finishing the bachelor's degree with distinction at the "Schola Cantorum Basiliensis", she entered a master's program, which she is still following at the moment.
During her studies as a singer, she was active in several projects offered by the school, especially to be named the "Opernklasse". She took part in numerous master classes and sang in projects conducted such as by Massimiliano Toni (Novara/Italy), Andrea Marcon (Basel/Switzerland), Alessandro di Marchi (Innsbruck/Austria), Maria Cristina Kiehr (Basel/Switzerland) and Gabriel Garrido (Genève/Switzerland). She is a private student of the renamed singing teacher Margreet Honig (Amsterdam/Netherlands). As a performer, she sang in many different ensembles and gave concerts in Germany, France, Italy and Romania.
Sebastian León - Voice
Born in Colombia in 1985, Sebastián León started his artistic studies at the Pontificia Universidad Javeriana and the Universidad el Bosque in Bogotá with Carlos Godoy. He took several masterclasses with Raphaël Boulay, Rosa Domiguez, Katarina Livljanic, Carlos Mena, Margreet Honig, Marcel Boone, Alessandro De Marchi, Jean-François Lombard, Agnès Mellon and baroque gesture courses with Sharon Weller.
He settled in Switzerland in 2008, where he continued his vocal studies at the Schola Cantorum Basilienis and moved on to obtain his Bachelor and Master degrees in Early Music with Gerd Türk and Dominique Vellard. Currently, he is taking lessons with the german baritone Marcus Niedermeyr.
In Colombia, he has worked with the Santa Cecilia Choir and different ensembles of early music. In Europe he has sung in “Les Ateliers Baroques” of Montfrin (France) conducted by Gabriel Garrido, in the gregorian chant project “Textlösigkeit” with Eric Mentzel, in Purcell’s opera “Dido & Aeneas” (as Aeneas) conducted by Leonardo García Alarcón, the Swiss Chamber Choir, the ensemble Gilles Binchois (Dominique Vellard), Scherzi Musicali (Nicolas Achten), Al Ayre Español (Eduardo López Banzo) and Capella Muriensis (Johannes Strobl). In 2012 he sung the title role in Francesca Caccini's opera "La Liberazione di Ruggiero" in Basel and Dresden conducted by Giorgio Paronuzzi. In addition, he is a member of the ensembles La Cetra Vokalensemble, La Boz Galana, La Musa Armonica and Flos Mundi.
Alicia Amo - Voice
Alicia Amo was born in 1984 and begun her musical studies at the Antonio de Cabezón conservatory of Burgos in the speciality of Violin with Raquel Rodríguez. In 2003 she enters Musikene (High School of Music of the Basque Country) where she studies with Félix Ayo, Lorenz Nasturica and Catalin Bucataru, and obtains in 2007 the Higher Diploma in Violin. In 2008 she continues her musical studies in the Universität fur Musik und Darstellende Kunst of Graz, where she improves her knowledge on violin with Maighread McCrann and begins her studies of singing with Joanna Borowska-Isser. In 2009 she moves to Basle (Switzerland) to study Singing at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis with Gerd Türk, Lina Akerlund and Alessandro de Marchi among others. In 2011 she gets the Bachelor degree and in 2013 the Master degree with the highest marks and Honors. She has also studied baroque violin with David Plantier and has taken part in two Operastudio with Pablo Maritano and Alberto Zedda.
She receives lessons from Andrew Lawrence King, María Espada, David Mason, Andreas Scholl, Emma Kirkby, Rolf Lieslevand, Víctor Torres, Dominique Vellard, Evelyn Tubb, Anthony Rooley, Edoardo Torbianelli, Casals Quartet, Manfredo Kraemer, Zeljko Haliti, Fran Peter Zimmermann, Sergio Azzolini, Christophe Coin, etc. She is currently having lessons with Rosa Domínguez, Carlos Mena, Richard Levitt and Margreet Honig.
She is winner of the Second Prize (first not awarded) at the VIII "Francesco Provenzale" International Baroque Singing Competition in Naples in 2011, the principal role in Génération Baroque (Le Parlement de Musique, Strasburg) in 2013, the programme Jóvenes Excelentes from Caja de Burgos in 2011 and 2012, the Fonds Marie-Louise (Basle, 2010), First prize at the Regino Sáinz de la Maza Competition (Burgos) in 2007, 2002 and 2001. She has been finalist at the I International “Opera de Tenerife” singing Competition in 2013 and the Norman Cooper Annual Chamber Music Competition (Aberdeen) in 2007.
She sings as soloist with the Orchestra di Camera di Lugano, Orchester Reinach, Schola Cantorum Basiliensis Ensemble, the Viola da Gamba Consort from the University of Salamanca, Musica Boscareccia, Il Zabaione Musicale, I Pizzicanti, Lamaraviglia, Li Sacri Cornetti, Ad Diatessaron, L’allegra Fonte... And she performs Mozart´s The Magic Flute (Erste Knabe role) in Graz, Purcell´s Dido and Eneas (Belinda and second Woman roles) in Burgos, F. Caccini´s La liberazione di Ruggiero (Nunzia and Damigella roles) in Basle and Dresden, Händel´s Ariodante (Dalinda role) at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, Monteverdi´s L´Orfeo (Musica, Euridice and Proserpina roles) in Hannover and Telemann´s Orpheus ou l´inextinguible soif de vengeance d´Orasia, Reine de Thrace (Orasia role) in Strasbourg, Mulhouse Spa and Offenburg.
Alicia Amo is member of Amsterdam Baroque Choir (ABC) (T. Koopman), the Vokalensemble La Cetra Basel (A. Marcon) and has collaborated with with the Capilla Peñaflorida.
In her trajectory as a violinist she has been concertmaster and soloist with the Spanish Youth Orchestra (JONDE) and the Symphonic Orchestra of Burgos, and member of the European Union Youth Orchestra (EUYO), Junge Philarmonie Wien Orchestra (WJO) and several chamber music ensembles. She has collaborated with the Steirische Philarmonie of Graz, the Symphonic Orchestra of Euskadi (OSE) and the Spanish Radio and Television Orchestra (OSRTVE).
As a baroque violinist she is member of I Barocchisti (D. Fasolis) and the Capilla de Santa María Baroque Orchestra from Vitoria, and has collaborated with the Baroque Ensemble from the Salamanca University and the Baroque Orchestra of Sevilla.
Cécile Mansuy - Organ
Enchanted by its sound, Cécile Mansuy chose the harpsichord as her first instrument at the age of five. Equally enraptured by the organ, she studied the two instruments in parallel, in the manner of the seventeenth- and eighteenth-century keyboard masters.
Aged eleven, she attended a masterclass with Davitt Moroney and gave her first public performances on harpsichord; both experiences left a lasting impression. She subsequently studied in Toulouse with J. W. Jansen (harpsichord), M. Bouvard (organ) and L. Boulay, Y. Bouvard and F. Saint-Yves (basso continuo), achieving her diploma with distinction. Further training followed at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis with J.-C- Zehnder & A. Marcon and at the Haute Ecole de Genève with A. Fedi. She studied improvisation with R. Lutz, E. Le Divellec and F. Eichelberger; harpsichord with B. Rannou, E. Joyé, N. Spieth, A. Zylberajch and M. Dévérité; and organ with A. Cea Galan, J. Boyer, M. Radulescu and M. Chapuis. In orchestra, opera and ensemble studies she received tuition from H. Niquet, L. Garcia Alarcon, B. Dickey, C. Toet, A. Rooley, E. Tubb and P. Pandolfo. Cécile Mansuy has given concerts in prestigious European venues including the Halle aux Grains in Toulouse, the Bâtiment des Forces Motrices in Geneva, the Morlacchi Theatre in Perugia and the Sala Filarmonica in Trento, in the festival Pavia Barocca 2012 – Ghieslieri Musica, in the Festival YOUNGS ARTITS IN CONCERT in Davos, Ambronay Festival... She has performed with D. Grimal (Orchestre National de Chambre de Toulouse), W. Dongois (Le Moment baroque), S. Azzolini (Parnassi Musici), E. Bronzi (Orchestre de l’Accademia Mozart de Bologne), C. Banchini (Capella Concertata) and other distinguished artists.