Julian Steckel - Biography

Julian Steckel was supported by BBT between 2007 and 2011.  For an up-to-date biography visit Impresariat Simmenauer.

Julian Steckel was born 1982 into a musical family. In 2010 he played his way to first prize in the ARD International Music Competition, also winning the audience award. Prior to receiving the above accolades, he won prizes at the Grand Prix Rostropovich in Paris, the Grand Prix Feuermann in Berlin, the Pablo Casals Competition in Kronberg and recieved a Borletti Buitoni Trust fellowship award. In 2012, Julian Steckel was awarded the much coveted ECHO Klassik for his BBT-supported recording of the cello concertos of Korngold and Goldschmidt as well as Bloch’s Schelomo alongside the Rheinische Philharmonie Koblenz under Daniel Raiskin.

Today, Julian Steckel is a regular guest with leading orchestras including the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Gewandhaus Orchestra Leipzig, Munich Philharmonic, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra London, Rotterdam Philharmonic, Orchestre de Paris, Gothenborg Symphony, Sankt Petersburg Philharmonic and most of the German Radio Symphony Orchestras. He has partnered with conductors such as Valery Gergiev, Christoph Eschenbach, Sir Roger Norrington, Christopher Hogwood, Mario Venzago, Kazuki Yamada, Heinrich Schiff, and John Storgårds.

In addition to his work as a soloist, Julian Steckel can be heard alongside leading fellow musicians such as Janine Jansen, Christian Tetzlaff, Antje Weithaas, Veronika Eberle, Menahem Pressler, Vilde Frang, Lars Vogt and Alexander Lonquich. A number of the foremost chamber music ensembles also value collaborating with the talented cellist including, among others, the Quatuor Ebène, the Armida and Modigliani Quartets, with whom Julian Steckel performed at major festivals such as the Lucerne Festival, the Schleswig-Holstein and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern festivals, Beethovenfest Bonn, and the festivals of Risor, Delft, Ludwigsburg, Moritzburg, Schwetzingen, Spannungen Heimbach, Zermatt, and Mondsee.

Julian Steckel studied with Ulrich Voss, Gustav Rivinius, Boris Pergamenschikow, Heinrich Schiff and Antje Weithaas and is himself a professor of cello at the Munich University of Music and Performing Arts. He plays an Andrea Guarneri cello (Cremona 1685) and enjoys living in Berlin.

Last updated: October 2018

I am deeply grateful and feel very much honoured to be chosen for a Borletti Buitoni Trust Fellowship. In these days of thousand and one competitions the Borletti Buitoni Trust stands as an exception because it really cares for its candidates in a way which I have never experienced before. The foundation’s support enables me to think further than I could do before and helps to make some of my dreams come real – it gives me new ideas, new inspiration and artistic freedom. Therefore I want to say thank you very much for all of your support!

Photographs by Marco Borggreve