Markus Möllenbeck, since 15 years teacher for Baroque cello at the Folkwang University of Arts in Essen (Germany) after teaching 16 years at the University of arts in Berlin, was holding an Online Lecture for the Juilliard School in New York on the New Year’s day. He, today a passionate researcher and editor of the repertoire for his instrument, was educated himself at the Folkwang University, and studying with Janos Starker, Prof. Maria Kliegel und Prof. Young-Chang Cho. After his studies he had dedicated himself to historical performance praxis and became for 9 years principal cellist in Reinhard Goebel´s MUSICA ANTIQUA KÖLN.
Since 2005 Möllenbeck is running his own series IL VIOLONCELLO CONCERTATO within the Edition Walhall of the Franz-Biersack-Company, Magdeburg/Germany while publishing cello concertos of the 18th century. Now his passion brought him to late compositions for the cello of Carl-Friedrich Abel (1723 – 1787) which never have been recorded or edited: 2 cello concertos b major and c major (WKO 52 and 60) and 2 Sinfonie Concertanti for oboe, violin & cello (WKO 42 and 43). Especially the late cello concerto c major from 1782, composed one year before Haydn’s d major concerto, is a real alternative option because of his technical skills and the high musical quality – in comparation to the often performed concertos of Haydn – and has just been released.
The matter during Möllenbeck’s online lecture, which took place as a part of the Cello Bootcamp of the Juilliard School, have been the circumstances of the Abel’s compositions and biography as much as also the quality of the manuscripts and prints which have been the templates for the editions.
By his lecture, Markus Möllenbeck reached almost 50 interested students, the majority have been cellists: among them students of the Folkwang University but also from the Music Academy Feliks Nowackiego in Bydgoszcz/Bromberg (Poland) to which he is connected by a professorship. So he was able to build a bridge from New York across the Atlantic to Essen in Germany and Bydgoszcz in Poland a first time.
This exchange is supposed to be continued in the future of 2023.
