At home in Salzburg and around the world for over 70 years: CAMERATA has left its mark on the city of music with its own concert series and as a regular ensemble at the Salzburg Festival and Mozart Week. As a cultural ambassador, it is also a regular guest in prestigious international concert halls such as Vienna's Konzerthaus, the Philharmonie de Paris, Hamburg's Elbphilharmonie, Amsterdam's Concertgebouw and the Shanghai Concert Hall. Comprising musicians from over 20 nations, the orchestra embodies a sound that is particularly representative of Viennese classical music, especially that of Salzburg's famous son, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The orchestra also explores works from the Romantic period with a new transparency typical of the chamber music format, while covering a repertoire ranging from the Baroque to the modern era.
In 1952, Salzburg-based Viennese conductor and musicologist Bernhard Paumgartner founded the Camerata Academica, an ensemble of teachers and students at the Mozarteum. His ambition was to create an ideal sound based on the personal responsibility of each musician in the service of the artistic community. From its very beginnings, under the direction of Mozart specialist Paumgartner, CAMERATA has devoted itself primarily to the work of the Salzburg composer. Notable tours and recordings, such as the complete Mozart piano concertos with Géza Anda in the 1960s and with Sir András Schiff in the 1980s, have established the orchestra on the international music scene.
Sándor Végh, Principal Conductor from 1978 to 1997, exerted the most decisive influence on CAMERATA's development. Under his direction, the operatic repertoire of Mozart, as well as works by Haydn, Beethoven and Schubert, came increasingly to the fore. His credo of approaching each piece as if performed by a string quartet (following Paumgartner's idea) still characterizes CAMERATA's sound and performance style today. Invitations to the Salzburg Festival as an opera orchestra have enabled the orchestra to further develop its skills. After Sándor Végh, Sir Roger Norrington, Leonidas Kavakos and Louis Langrée took over.
In 2016, true to its tradition as a chamber orchestra, CAMERATA decided to assume its own artistic direction. Under the direction of the "primi inter pares", the orchestra has since performed with a democratic spirit, guided by its first violins Gregory Ahss and Giovanni Guzzo, and collaborates according to repertoire with guest conductors such as Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Philippe Herreweghe, Manfred Honeck, François Leleux or Finnegan Downie-Dear. La CAMERATA also works closely with its artistic partners, French pianist Hélène Grimaud and Dutch violinist Janine Jansen. In the 2024/25 season, CAMERATA will also be working with artists such as Lisa Batiashvili, Mao Fujita, Sheku Kanneh-Mason, Fazıl Say, Dorothee Oberlinger and Richard Galliano.
In addition to its engagements at the Salzburg Festival and Mozart Week, the orchestra will be represented at international festivals such as the Gstaad Menuhin Festival, Rheingau Music Festival, Canary Festival and Ruhr Piano Festival during the 2024/25 season.
CAMERATA pays particular attention to the development of young talent, and carries out intensive musical education work with the CAMERATA Young program. Inclusive projects such as "Papageno goes to school" and intergenerational concerts make classical music accessible to all sections of the population. Wherever possible, CAMERATA also integrates educational projects into its tours.
Recent recordings with the orchestra's artistic partner Hélène Grimaud, released by Deutsche Grammophon, include "The Messenger" (2020) with works by Mozart and Valentin Silvestrov, and a live recording of Robert Schumann's piano concerto from the Elbphilharmonie (2022). What these two recordings have in common is that concertmaster Giovanni Guzzo conducted the CAMERATA from his console.
A new recording of works by Robert Schumann with cellist Kian Soltani, conducted by concertmaster Gregory Ahss, will be released by Deutsche Grammophon in summer 2024.
