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About isa
What began in 1991 as a masterclass for string players attended by 13 students has since grown into an event that is unique worldwide: a summertime campus in the Semmering/Rax region of the Vienna Alps that offers up to 250 highly gifted young musicians from more than 40 countries a diverse programme of master classes, workshops, lectures, events, and cross-cutting interdisciplinary projects each year.
Now in its 33rd year of existence, isa – the International Summer Academy of the mdw – University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna invites world-class young artists to participate in a multitude of courses for instrumentalists, singers, chamber musicians, and composers and additionally features the music mediation programme isaCommunity as well as the international interdisciplinary academic conference isaScience.
About the mdw
The mdw – University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna numbers among the world’s largest and most renowned universities specialised in music, theatre, and film. Over 3,000 students from more than 70 countries are currently being trained in 115 degree programmes encompassing music and other performing arts, science and research, and education. The mdw’s altogether 25 departments include the Max Reinhardt Seminar and Film Academy Vienna.
More on the mdw
HISTORY of isa
isa, the International Summer Academy of the mdw – University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna was founded in 1991 as an mdw initiative headed by Univ.-Prof. DDr. h.c. Michael Frischenschlager. It arose from the euphoria sparked by the fall of the Iron Curtain and aimed to facilitate musical encounters and build international relationships between exceptionally gifted young students hailing above all from Central and Eastern European countries.
Ever since its 15th edition (2005), current artistic director Univ.-Prof. Dr h.c. Johannes Meissl has worked consistently to develop isa into an undertaking that draws its identity from its mix of courses, highly diverse workshops, festival performances, academic reflection, and innovative interdisciplinary artistic projects as well as from the networks of friends that invariably form and grow. The mdw places particular importance on combining superlative artistic and organisational quality with social and intercultural community.
In collaboration with numerous international partner universities, isa’s diverse offerings featuring internationally renowned tutors provide its select group of participants with crucial artistic impulses, comprehensive developmental opportunities, and a both unique and holistic creative experience.
OVERVIEW
Since 1991 Master classes for solo strings (without double bass)
Since 1993 Master classes for string quartet
Since 1994 Master classes for solo winds and wind chamber music
Since 1995 Master classes in composition
Since 1998 Master classes for singers
Since 1999 Master classes for piano & chamber music with piano
2003–2010 Master classes in conducting
Since 2005 A diverse and constantly expanding range of supplementary workshops and lectures
Since 2006 Master classes for double bass
Since 2013 Development of the concert series isaFestival
Since 2013 isaScience – a forum for the scientific and scholarly community
2019 isaOperetta
2020 isaDigital
ARTISTIC DIRECTION
1991–2004: em. o. Univ.-Prof. DDr. h.c. Michael Frischenschlager
Since 2005: Univ.-Prof. Dr. h.c. Johannes Meissl
PARTNER UNIVERSITIES
It soon proved possible to bring on board the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague (HAMU) and the Liszt Ferenc Academy of Music in Budapest as the main cooperating partners. Moreover, each annual edition of the International Summer Academy since then has also featured collaboration with a number of other leading universities of music from the CEE countries—namely those in Bratislava, Brno, Zagreb, Sofia, Bucharest, Ljubljana, Belgrade, Novi Sad, Sarajevo, Vilnius, and Krakow—as well as participation by renowned university-level institutions based in London, Paris, New York, Tokyo, and elsewhere.
FAMOUS TEACHERS
The International Summer Academy’s list of prominent present and past tutors includes the leading pedagogues of its partner universities and the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna—many of whom have been and continue to be active worldwide as artists, including in famous ensembles and orchestras such as the Alban Berg Quartet, the Amadeus Quartet, the Bartók Quartet, the Janáček Quartet, the Czech Philharmonic, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, the Vienna Philharmonic, etc.
High-powered encounters with famous personalities such as Alfred Brendel, Carl Djerassi, Ivry Gitlis, Thomas Hampson, Daniel Harding, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Sharon Kam, Leonidas Kavakos, Gidon Kremer, György Kurtág, Heinrich Schiff, Krysztof Penderecki, Dora Schwarzberg, and Tabea Zimmermann underline the International Summer Academy’s superlative artistic standards.
FORMER PARTICIPANTS
In the past, isa participants have taken part successfully in major international competitions such as the ARD Competition (Munich), the Fritz Kreisler Competition (Vienna), the Menuhin Competition (Folkstone), the Osaka Chamber Music Competition, the Paganini Competition (Genoa), the Prague Spring Competition, etc. Numerous former students of isa now pursue careers on the world’s concert stages or perform at opera houses and in great orchestras including the Budapest State Opera, the Sofia State Opera, the Czech National Theatre, the Vienna State Opera, the Zagreb State Opera, the Vienna Philharmonic, the Berlin Philharmonic, the Budapest Festival Orchestra, the Munich Philharmonic, the Wiener Symphoniker, the Czech Philharmonic, and others.
Archive
2021 unlimited
isaFestival
isaMasterClass
isaOutreach
isaScience
Jubilee Folder 30 Years of isa
2020 Heroes?
Welcome to isaDigital
2019 Just Play?!
isaFestival
isaMasterClass
isaOutreach
isaScience
isaOperetta
2018 Music and Democracy
isaFestival
isaMasterClass
isaOutreach
isaScience
2017 Motion
isaFestival 2017
isaMasterClass 2017
isaScience 2017
2016 DRAMA
isaFestival 2016
isaMasterClass 2016
isaOperaVienna 2016
isaScience 2016
2015 Jubilee
isaFestival 2015
isaMasterClass 2015
isaOperaVienna 2015
isaScience 2015
2014 Times of Change
isaFestival 2014
isaMasterClass 2014
isaOperaVienna 2014
isaScience 2014
2013 Scandal?!
isaFestival 2013
isaMasterClass 2013
isaOperaVienna 2013
isaScience 2013
2012 1912 – Fall and Rise
Concert calendar
Master Class
Singers
2011 Liszt and the Longing for the Mediterranean
Concert calendar
Master Class
Singers
2010 as time goes by…
Concert calendar
Master Class
Singers
2009 Haydn the Progressive
2008 Music of the North
2007 French Music
2006 With Mozart everything is Opera