Resounding success at the opening concert of the 64th Pollença Festival

PalmThe Cloister of the Convent of Sant Domingo hosted the opening concert of the 64th Pollença Festival. This event enjoyed the support of the entire audience. The entire venue, which sold out days before the concert, enjoyed the extraordinary talent and repertoire of the great violist Janine Jansen and the wonderful Camerata Salzburg, conducted by violinist Gregory Ahss.

Janine Jansen maintains long-standing relationships with the world's most eminent orchestras and conductors. Throughout the 2025/26 season, she will be an "Artist in Residence" with the Berliner Philharmoniker, participating in performances with Kirill Petrenko (Brahms), Sir Simon Rattle (Prokofiev No. 1), and Tughan Sokhiev (Bruch), as well as in chamber music programs with members of the Berliner Philharmoniker. She will also appear as a "Featured Artist" with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, alongside conductors Esa-Pekka Salonen and Sir Antonio Pappano, collaborating on various chamber music programs during the Baltic Sea Festival and the orchestra's main season. Extensive tours are planned with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra/Mäkelä, the London Symphony Orchestra/Pappano, and the Tonhalle Orchestra/Paavo Järvi. She continues her artistic collaboration with Camerata Salzburg, culminating in two major tours of Asia and Europe. She also has orchestral engagements with the Orchestre de Paris/Mäkelä, the Filarmonica della Scala/Luisi, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe/Rachlin, and the Orchestre della Suisse Romande/Viotti. Her musical collaborations with Martha Argerich and Mischa Maisky continue, with appearances at the Musikverein in Vienna, Lucerne, and Tokyo, as well as with her regular recital partners Denis Kozhukhin and Sunwook Kim in Asia and Europe. Janine records exclusively for Decca Classics. Her latest recording, released in June 2024, includes the Sibelius Violin Concerto and Prokofiev Violin Concerto No. 1, alongside Klaus Mäkelä and the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra, and was met with great critical acclaim. She is the founder and artistic director of the Utrecht International Chamber Music Festival and co-artistic director of the Sion Festival. In December 2025, she will return to London to give two concerts at the Beare's Festival. Since November 2023, she has been a violin professor at the Kronberg Academy. Janine studied with Coosje Wijzenbeek, Philipp Hirshhorn, and Boris Belkin. She plays the 1715 Shumsky-Rode Stradivarius, generously loaned by a European benefactor. Janine Jansen is a PIRASTRO artist and uses Evah Pirazzi Neo strings.

Camerata Salzburg has been a mainstay of the Salzburg music scene for over seventy years, with its own concert series and a regular presence at the Salzburg Festival and the Mozartwoche. As a cultural ambassador, it performs in prestigious venues such as the Vienna Konzerthaus, the Paris Philharmonic, the Elbphilharmonie, the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, and the Shanghai Concert Hall. Its sound, shaped by musicians from over twenty countries, excels in interpretations of Mozart and the Viennese classical repertoire, and explores music from the Baroque to contemporary. Founded in 1952 by Bernhard Paumgartner at the Mozarteum, it cemented its reputation with recordings such as Mozart's piano concertos with Géza Anda and Sir András Schiff. Sándor Végh, Chief Conductor from 1978 to 1997, expanded his repertoire with Haydn, Beethoven, and Schubert, establishing the chamber approach that defines his style. He was followed by Sir Roger Norrington, Leonidas Kavakos, and Louis Langrée. Since 2016, CAMERATA has operated under a collective leadership model spearheaded by its concertmasters Gregory Ahss and Giovanni Guzzo, and collaborated with conductors such as Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Philippe Herreweghe, and Manfred Honeck. It maintains partnerships with pianist Hélène Grimaud and violinist Janine Jansen, and in the 2024/25 season has worked with artists such as Lisa Batiashvili, Mao Fujita, Sheku Kanneh-Mason, and Fazil Say. In addition to its presence in Salzburg, it has participated in festivals such as Gstaad Menuhin, the Rheingau Festival, the Canary Islands Festival, and the Ruhr Piano Festival. Her commitment to music education is reflected in CAMERATA Young and pedagogical projects on international tours. Her recordings with Deutsche Grammophon include The Messenger (2020) with Hélène Grimaud, the Schumann Piano Concerto (2022) conducted by Giovanni Guzzo, and her most recent album with Kian Soltani under concertmaster Gregory Ahs2, released.

Israeli violinist Gregory Ahss made his solo debut under Claudio Abbado and the Mozart Orchestra of Bologna. He continued to perform regularly with Abbado, who appointed him concertmaster of the Lucerne Festival Orchestra. Gregory's recording of Haydn's Sinfonia Concertante with the Mozart Orchestra under Claudio Abbado has won several prestigious awards, including the ICMA for Best Concert of the Year 2015. As a soloist, he has also collaborated with Yannick Nézet-S Andrés Orozco Estrada, the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, the Mozart Orchestra of Bologna, the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Munich Symphony Orchestra, and CAMERATA Salzburg. Gregory is regularly invited to participate in educational projects and masterclasses, for example, at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, and is a jury member at the Sendai International Music Competition. His chamber music colleagues include Natalia Gutman, Janine Jansen, Vilde Frang, James Ehnes, Lawrence Power, Emmanuel Pahud, Gautier Capuçon, Nicolas Altstaedt, Sabine Meyer, Alexander Melnikov, and Fazil Say. Gregory Ahss has also collaborated with Pinchas Zukerman as a violin duo. He has also been a guest conductor with renowned groups such as the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, the Bologna Mozart Orchestra, the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra, the Belgrade Philharmonic, the Zurich Chamber Orchestra, the Gran Canaria Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Lucerne Philharmonic Orchestra, conducting complete symphonic works. Gregory began his training in his hometown of Moscow at the Gnessin School of Music. He continued his studies with Lena Mazor and Irina Svetlova at the Israel Conservatory, the Tel Aviv Academy of Music, and later at the New England Conservatory in Boston, in the class of Donald Weilerstein. He previously served as concertmaster of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra and is currently concertmaster of the Camerata Salzburg, the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra, and the Lucerne Festival Orchestra.

The opening concert was attended by Mr. Pedro Vidal, regional secretary of Culture and Sports of the Balearic Government, and a large part of the Pollença Town Council.