Jan Nigges
In 2019 SWR called the recorder player Jan Nigges an ‘up-and-coming star on his instrument’. At just 25 years old, he is one of the most outstanding representatives of the instrument. He was already performing his first solo concerts on professional music stages when he was only 14. He was a young protégé in Prof. Michael Schneider’s class in Frankfurt am Main, where he later also completed his music degree. In addition to playing the recorder, Jan Nigges discovered his love of other woodwind instruments such as the Baroque oboe and the flute traversiere early on. He studied these instruments under names such as Prof. Benoit Laurent and Prof. Karl Kaiser at the HfMDK in Frankfurt.

Jan Nigges gives concerts internationally as a soloist and with his ensemble. In the past three years he has been a guest at the Opus Amadeus Oda Müziği Festivali in Istanbul, the Riga Early Music Centre in Latvia, the Festival d’Ambronay in France, the Centro Musica Antica in Italy, the Narodowe Forum Muzyki (NFM) in Poland, the Stiftung Mozarteum in Austria, the Merano Festival in South Tyrol, the Vesperali Festival Lugano in Ticino and the MA Festival Brugge in Belgium.

In Germany he was very pleased about invitation to the Rheingau Musik Festival, the Thüringer Bachwochen, the Mozartfest Würzburg, The Festspiele Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, the Neuburger Barockkonzerte, the WEilburger Schlosskonzerte, the Händel-Festspiele Göttingen, the ‘Sparda-Bank Klassik Open Air’ Bayreuth, the Festival Summerwinds in the Münster region, the Oberstdorfer Musiksommer, the Telemann Festspiele Magdeburg and the Frankfurter Bachkonzerte in the Alte Oper.

He is the founder of the quartet 4 Times Baroque, which in autumn 2018 was awarded the OPUS KLASSIK prize in the category ‘young artists of the year’ live on TV (channel ZDF) by presenter Thomas Gottschalk.

Jan Nigges has also been a guest on the television shows ZDF Morgenmagazin and ‘Stars von morgen’ with Rolando Villazón on ARTE.

As a cultural manager and co-founder of the Vox Orchester Jan Nigges produced an Easter special for Swiss television station Radio Televisione Svizzera together with the tenor Christoph Prégardien and Lorenzo Ghirlanda in Lugano in the summer of 2017.

In addition to cultural consultation and management, music pedagogy, student concerts, presenting and music advocacy are also firm components of his work. In 2014 he organised the international masterclass Barockwoche 2014 at the Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst Frankfurt am Main, which saw more than 100 participants from all around the world.

Jan Nigges teaches students of different ages to deepen the scope of the academic subject recorder music in Germany and other countries, such as at the Strothoff International School, and in 2020 as part of a masterclass at the Konservatorium Magdeburg. Against the background of his work Jan Nigges regularly gives interviews on various radio programmes put out by the broadcasters HR, BR, MDR, SWR, ORF, Deutschlandfund and Deutschlandradio.

He was a scholarship holder of Yehudi Menuhin LMN Frankfurt and also won awards at the Biagio-Marini-Wettbewerb and at the international presenter competition hosted by Forum Alte Musik Frankfurt.

Within the concert sphere he has worked with a number of big names in early music, for example Andreas Scholl, Dorothee Oberlinger, Luca Pianca, Dmirty Sinkovsky and Michael Hofstetter. In the realm of neue musik, too, Jan Nigges is involved in new compositions for 4 Times Baroque. It was upon his initiative, for example, that a commissioned work by the composer Christopher Brandt was published for 4 Times Baroque in 2018. A further composition by Gregor Mayrhofer, who has in the past worked with the Berlin Philharmonic, is planned for 2020.

For the autumn/winter 2020 season Jan Nigges is planning to release a further CD featuring recorder concertos by German composers with the record label SONY CLASSICAL.

Alexander von Heißen
is a young harpsichordist from Germany who started playing the harpsichord at the age of 13 and had his first lessons with Diez Eichler at Dr. Hoch's Konservarorium in Frankfurt. Since 2014 he is studying harpsichord with Eva Maria Pollerus at Frankfurt University of Music and Performing Arts. He took part in master classes with Pierre Hantai, Skip Sempé, Christophe Rousset and Jesper Christensen. Additionally he was having lessons in pianoforte with Jesper Christensen and Jazz piano with Christoph Spendel. He was awarded with the first prize at the XXIII. International Bach Competition in Leipzig and with a second prize at the international harpsichord competition „Musica Antiqua“ in Bruges. With the Ensemble 4 Times Baroque he received the Echo follow-up award Opus Klassik in 2018 as young artist of the year. He has released numerous CDs both as a soloist and as an ensemble member, including on the Deutsche Harmonia Mundi (Sony Classical) label.

In collaboration with artists such as Andreas Scholl, Dorothee Oberlinger, Luca Pianca, Michael Schneider and Reinhard Goebel, he has performed at the MA Festival Bruges, the Festival Oude Muziek Utrecht, the Händelfestspiele in Halle, the Thuringian Bach Festival, the Rheingau Music Festival and the Mozart Festival Würzburg.

Since 2019 he has been a lecturer at the Cologne University of Music and Dance. Since 2021 he has been teaching the subjects harpsichord and performance practice at the Münster University of Music and since 2022 harpsichord and basso continuo at the Frankfurt University of Music and Performing Arts.