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Torsten Janicke,
born in Dresden in 1958, is a product of the famous Dresden string school. He began to learn
violin at the age of 7, and quite soon afterwards, was a prize - winner in
the Young Musicians Competition of the then East Germany. On account of his outstanding
talent, he was called to attend the Dresden specialist music school at the
age of 13. From 1976 - 1982, he studied at the Dresden „Carl Maria von
Weber“ music college with Prof. Heinz Rudolf, and in Prof. Gustav Schmahl’s master-class, attending mastercourses with Prof. Oleg Kryssa,
Prof. Wolfgang Marschner and Prof. André Gertler.
Torsten Janicke carried off prizes and distinctions
in various international competitions: such as the Bach Competition in Leipzig 1980, the Tibor
Varga Violin Competition in Sion
1985 and the Indianapolis Violin Competition 1986.
In 1982, the Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra engaged
the 24-year-old as first concertmaster. From 1989 he played in the same
position with the Essen Philharmonics, followed by the Gürzenich Orchestra /
Cologne Philharmonic in 1991.
His solo career has taken him all over Europe, to the USA and to Africa. He had engagements with many
renowned orchestras, including the Radio Symphony Orchestra of Leipzig and
Berlin, The Dresden Philharmonic, the Berlin Symphony Orchestra, the State
Philharmonic in Halle, the Essen Philharmonic, the
Gürzenich Orchestra / Cologne Philharmonic, the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra,
the Het Brabants Orkest Eindhoven, the Kassel State Theatre Orchestra, the Philharmonic
Orchestra of Dortmund, the Cairo Symphony, the Poznan
Symphony, the Slovakian Nationalphilharmony
Bratislava, the Romanian Radio Symphony Orchestra Bucarest,
the Presidential Symphony Orchestra Ankara and the St. Petersburg State
Orchestra, working with conductors like Heinz Wallberg,
Claus Peter Flor, Peter Schneider, Jiři Bělohlávek, Horia Andreescu, Jörg Peter Weigle, Marcello Viotti, Leopold Hager, Carlos Kalmar,
Carl Anton Rickenbacher, Jac
van Steen, Georg Fritzsch,
Marc Soustrot, Wolf Dieter Hauschild,
Heribert Beissel, Michail Jurowski and Dmitri KItajenko.
He has recorded with the Bavarian and West German
Radio Companies, as well as Radio de la Suisse Romande.
His first CD with the Strauss Violinconcerto and the Sonata for Violin and Piano was
published in march 1999 at ebs - classics. Chambermusic CD’s by Johann Evangelist Brandl that have drawn a lot of attention were recorded
in 2002 and 2003 by MDG (Dabringhaus & Grimm).
The Max Bruch Violinconcertos
3 and 1 he recorded in 2003 with the Gürzenich Orchestra Köln (Conductor
Markus Stenz) and also in 2003 he made the first
world-recording of all three Violinconcertos by
Hans Werner Henze (price “Deutsche Schallplattenkritik”, “supersonic
award” and Midem classic award “Artist
of the year 2007”).
Torsten Janicke is also intensively involved in
chamber music, as Primarius of the Gürzenich
Quartet, leader of the Gürzenich Chamber Orchestra and a number of further
orchestras in Germany and China.
Besides the usual well-known favourites, his
repertoire includes many less played works: like the violin concertos of Hans
Werner Henze, Richard Strauss, Louis Spohr, Witold Lutoslawski and Karol Szymanowski.
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