Phonographies - Detail

HOLLIGER, Heinz

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Place of birth
Langenthal

Date of birth
21.05.1939

Citizenship
Switzerland

Activity
Composer; Arrangement; Conductor; Author of the accompanying notes

Musical instrument
Oboe; English horn

Musical genre
Classical music; Mass; Nocturne; Trio; Cantata; Contemporary music

Biographical history
Heinz Holliger is a Swiss oboist, conductor and composer, born in Langenthal, Canton Bern in 1939. He studied oboe, piano and composition (under Sándor Veress and Pierre Boulez) in Bern, Paris and Basle, and his international career as an oboist was launched in 1959 when he won first prize at the Geneva International Music Competition. In 1961, he also won the ARD International Music Competition in Munich.

Holliger has expanded the technical potential of his instrument and is a strong advocator of contemporary music and lesser-known works, with a number of composers, including Henze, Ligeti and Lutosławski, dedicating new scores to him. In 1977, Holliger began his career as a conductor, working with some of the most renowned orchestras in the world such as the Berlin Philharmonic, the Vienna Philharmonic, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam and the Philharmonia Orchestra. He has composed theatrical music (Schneewittchen, 1998), symphonic music, solo concerts (Hommage à Louis Soutter, 1995, revised in 2002), and chamber and vocal music (Drei Liebeslieder, 1960).

Holliger has received numerous awards throughout his career, including the Sonning Musikpreis (1987), the Frankfurter Musikpreis (1988), the Venice Biennale Abbiati Prize (1995), the Swiss Music Prize (2015), the Robert Schumann Prize (2017) and the Cross of the Order of Merit of Germany (2020).