Petrit Çeku
Petrit Çeku’s sensitivity and expressiveness have captivated audiences worldwide. He has performed recitals across the globe and appeared as a soloist with renowned orchestras, including the Baltimore Symphony, Calgary Philharmonic, Czech Chamber Philharmonic, Daejeon Philharmonic, State Hermitage Orchestra of St. Petersburg, Pannon Philharmonic, and Zagreb Philharmonic. A frequent collaborator with the Zagreb Soloists, he is also a founding member of the Guitar Trio Elogio and Croatian Guitar Quartet.
Hailed by the Calgary Herald as “an effortless player, with a strong, projecting sound,” Çeku has won numerous international guitar competitions, securing prestigious first prizes at the Parkening (Malibu, USA), Schadt (Allentown, USA), Biasini (Bologna, Italy), and Pittaluga (Alessandria, Italy) competitions. In 2018, he was the only classical musician featured in the Night of the Proms tour with the Antwerp Philharmonic, conducted by Alexandra Arrieche, sharing the stage with pop icons Bryan Ferry, Milow, Seal, and Suzanne Vega.
Born in Prizren, Kosovo, Çeku is based in Zagreb, Croatia. He studied guitar at the Academy of Music of the University of Zagreb with Darko Petrinjak before continuing at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, USA, under Manuel Barrueco. After serving on the faculty of the University of Music and Performing Arts in Graz, Austria, since 2019, Çeku was appointed in 2025 to the faculty of his alma mater – the Academy of Music of the University of Zagreb – where he teaches and mentors the next generation of guitarists.
His recordings have been released by BuntArt, Cantus, Croatia Records, EPR Classic, Eudora Records, Granola and Naxos. His album The Cello Suites, featuring Bach’s complete Cello Suites, was nominated for an ICMA Award. The recording process was documented in Sarabande, a film directed by award-winning filmmaker Kaltrina Krasniqi. Expanding their collaboration, Çeku later composed the original score for Krasniqi’s feature film Vera Dreams of the Sea, which premiered at the 78th Venice Film Festival.
Petrit Çeku is a D’Addario artist and performs on a Ross Gutmeier guitar.
Guy Braunstein
“I always remain who I am. Only the music decides my meaning.” (Guy Braunstein) A unique blend of virtuosity, restraint and creativity – this is what violinist, conductor and composer Guy Braunstein stands for. Like few others, he not only knows how to convince audiences with his music, but also how to challenge them: Whether with demanding programmes, sophisticated interpretations or his own works and arrangements – Guy Braunstein aims to surprise and reinvent. And although he can
easily be categorised in the “tradition of the great Jewish violinists such as Mischa Elman and Isaac Stern” (Telegraph), for him music lives not only from its own history, but through perpetual renewal, updating and unexpected twists and turns.
Whether as a celebrated soloist who masters the standard repertoire from Bach to Shostakovich with ease, or as a congenial chamber music partner in a wide variety of formations: Guy Braunstein is a guest at the world’s most important music centres and festivals. He has performed with renowned orchestras such as the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Philharmonia Orchestra London and the Berlin Philharmonic. His musical partners include András Schiff, Zubin, Mehta, Maurizio Pollini, Vladimir Fedoseyev, Yefim Bronfman, Daniel Barenboim, Simon Rattle, Martha Argerich, Mitsuko Uchida, Christoph von Dohnányi, Lang Lang, Emmanuel Ax, Andris Nelsons and Semyon Bychkov.
Guy Braunstein is also present on the international concert stage as a conductor: he was Conductor and Artist inResidence with the Hamburg Symphony Orchestra and the Trondheim Symfoniorkester and works with orchestras such as the Helsinki, Rotterdam and Israel Philharmonic as well as the Queensland Symphony Orchestra.
Highlights of the 2023/24 season include concerts with the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra, the Budapest Festival Orchestra, the Helsingborg Symphony Orchestra,the Prague Chamber Soloists and the Copenhagen Phil, in which Guy Braunstein will appear as soloist and conductor. The programmes include his own works such as “Die Nacht wird immer verklärter” and the Rusalka Rhapsody as well as the violin concertos by Elgar, Delius and Haydn.
Guy Braunstein’s greatest and identity-forming passion is arranging and composing: In the romantic tradition of Paganini and Liszt, he brilliantly transcribes musical masterpieces for his own or other instruments and instrumentations and presents operas, chamber music or even songs in a completely new form. In addition to excerpts from Tchaikovsky’s “Eugene Onegin” and “Swan Lake”, he has also arranged Puccini arias and Dvořák’s opera “Rusalka”. In 2023, “Die Nacht wird immer verklärter”, an rrangement of Schönberg’s string sextet “Verklärte Nacht”, celebrated its premiere with the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin. The violinist is particularly fond of Beatles songs: in addition to the Six Variations on “Blackbird” and arrangements of “A Hard Day’s Night” and “Something”, Guy Braunstein also wrote the “Abbey Road Concerto”, a very virtuosic version of the Beatles’ album “Abbey Road” for solo violin and orchestra.
