Violin prodigy takes Music Fest stage
Aspen, CO Colorado
ALL |
ASPEN ” On the surface, Veronika Eberle might look like any other nineteen-year-old.
She goes to school on weekdays. She studies through the late afternoons. Her favorite subject is German.
But this teenager is taking the music world by storm, quickly establishing herself as one of the most promising violinists to emerge recently from Germany.
Eberle, who will perform along with the Aspen Concert Orchestra at the Benedict Music Tent on Friday, July 13, made her concerto debut at age 10 and has since played in Milan, Moscow, and throughout Europe, as well as with some of Germany’s best orchestras.
However, her trip to the Aspen Music Festival and School is her first to the United States.
“I’m very excited about the flight, and of course I’m very excited about the performance and the musicians in Aspen,” she said. “I’ve heard so many great things about this Festival.”
Eberle began playing violin at age six after taking an interest because a friend had started lessons. From there, her love for the instrument grew, and she says soon she wanted to make music her life.
Four years later she began studies as a junior student at the Münchner Konservatorium with Olga Voitova. After private studies with Christoph Poppen she joined the Hochschule in Munich, where she continues to study with Ana Chumachenco, who is also Julia Fischer’s teacher.
Eberle attends school full-time, study ing subjects like geography, Latin, physics and math, and she looks forward to attending university in a year. Often, she gets home from school in the late afternoon without much time left for music and admits she must utilize her weekends and holidays to practice. But, while she admits being a full-time student and musician can sometimes be difficult to balance, she said anything is manageable with hard work.
“Sometimes it’s very much to do, but I think when you really want to do it, you can,” she said. “When you want to finish school and to make music and play concerts and do so many things at the same time, then there is always a way.”
Though Eberle has received much recognition for her music, including being honored by the Deutsche Stiftung Musikleben Hamburg and the Jürgen-Ponto Stiftung Frankfurt, and winning first prize at the 2003 Yfrah Neaman International Competition in Mainz, she notes it is important to keep a level head.
“Of course it’s a big honor to have awards and such, but I think it’s not the important thing in my life,” she said. “The important thing is trusting the music. I’m doing it because I love it, and music is not only a part of my life, but it’s a part of myself.”
It is the opportunity to express feelings through music that could not otherwise be communicated in words, that draws her to the profession, Eberle explained.
At her performance in Aspen, Eberle will perform Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto in D major, a piece she said is challenging. However, rather than concentrating on the traditionally difficult aspects of the piece, she hopes audiences will embrace the music with an open mind.
“I think it’s important to listen with your heart, soul, and your ears and not with your intentions,” she says. ” I hope that they are touched when they go home, I would like to speak to the people with my music.”
