Florence Sitruk, Music Director

Photo: Christian Nielinger
Photo: Christian Nielinger

Florence Sitruk, of French-German origin, came the first time at age 12 to just listen to the Israel Harp Contest. Ami Ma’ayani, eminent Israeli composer, predicted, she would premiere his Concerto Symphonique one day. In the meantime established as “one of the finest artists in her field”, according to late György Sebök, she live-recorded Maayani at age 20 with the Heidelberg Philharmonic, followed by many more world premieres of composers, such as György Kurtág, Ferenc Farkas, Robert HP Platz, etc.

She studied at Paris Conservatory with Marielle Nordmann, before graduating with a brilliant artist diploma with her most influential teachers Susann McDonald and György at Indiana University/USA. She also holds degrees in musicology and philosophy, and studied early music with Robert Hill, harpischordist. She has furthermore worked in masterclasses with eminent musicians such as György Sebök, György Kurtág, or Ferenc Rados, constantly enlarging the repertoire of her instrument.

Since her debut at the age of 15 with the Camerata Academica Salzburg under Sándor Vegh, she concertizes regularly as a soloist with orchestras such as the Lucerne Festival Strings, the Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, the Dresden Philharmonic, the Freiburg Baroque Soloists, the Lithuanian Philharmonic, the St. Christopher Chamber Orchestra, the Neusser Kammerakademie, or the Deutsche Symphonie-Orchester Berlin with which she gave her worldwide broadcasted debut at the Berlin Philharmonic with Elias Parish Alvars Concerto op. 98. Solo recitals and chamber music have taken her to all four continents, from the Metropolitan Museum of Art New York to the Alte Oper Frankfurt, the Tower 101 Taipei, the Teatro da Paz/Belem, to Brisbane and Tasmania, as well as to the Glinka Hall/St. Petersburg. As a chamber recitalist, she has performed with many leading quartets, and enjoys close cooperation with the Ciurlionis string quartet Vilnius, with Rachel Harnisch, soprano, Stella Dufexis, mezzo soprano or Gergely Bodoky, flute.

Florence Sitruk won more than seven national and international top prizes, among which 1st prize in the Rome International Competition Valentino Bucchi for Music of the 20th century. Since 2010, succeeding Gidon Kremer, she has been artistic director of the Swiss contemporary chamber music festival “les muséiques”, as well as of her in 2008 founded Elias Parish Alvars Festival in Teignmouth/Devon, England. At only age 26, she was appointed guest prof. at the Lithuanian Music Academy and, being a passionate pedagogue, put the harp class there on the international platform. In 2008, she was appointed adjunct prof. at Tokyo Tech University, Japan.
Since 2005, being then the youngest in her field, she is professor of harp at the Geneva Music University where she enjoys an international harp class. Florence Sitruk is also young mother of twins and lives with her family in Berlin.