We begin this new season with fantastic news! The following artists join our Agency: pianist Marco Mezquida (symphonic projects), the violinist Soyoung Yoon and the Catalan soprano Marta Mathéu.
Marco Mezquida joins Marén Artists in collaboration with Julio Quintas Management for his symphonic projects. After his success playing Rhapsody in Blue with symphonic orchestras (alongside his piano jazz trio), the Orquestra Simfònica del Vallès and the Palau de la Musica Catalana asked him to compose a Piano Concerto. “Talaiot” was premiered in 2023 with a great success of public and critical acclaim.
At only 33 years of age, Mezquida shines equally as composer, pianist, improviser, accompanist and bandleader; that he is eclectic and versatile, is to name the obvious. Above all, Marco is a playful and unpredictable artist, who creates a world of his own that is at once inviting and fascinating.
Mezquida is creative and resourceful, blending influences of Keith Jarrett, Schubert, Bill Evans, Rachmaninov and Paul Bley. He lets them all in, invites them to play in his music, integrates them into his stream of consciousness.
Mezquida plays in a large variety of constellations including solo piano, accompanied by orchestras, duos and trios. His music crosses genres, including jazz as well as his original approaches to Ravel, Handel or Chopin, flamenco, or popular Latin American music. One of his most successful projects in the last few years has been Chicuelo y Mezquida, a trio that blends jazz and flamenco together.
The list of artists with whom Mezquida has shared the stage and studio is extensive. Among them, renowned figures like Lee Konitz and Bill McHenry. He has played at venues in 24 countries, including Marciac, Budapest Music Center, Conde Duque of Madrid, Jazzaldia, Jazzahead!, Kölner Philharmonie, ORF Auditorium in Vienna, SFJazz and Jazz in the Factory in Sao Paulo. The Association of Jazz Musicians and Modern Music of Catalonia have awarded him «Musician of the Year” four times in five years.
Violinist Soyoung Yoon has garnered acclaim for her “meticulous… highly disciplined” (Gramophone) and “suave” performances whose “technical perfection is always placed at the service of the music” (The Guardian).
Prize winner of major competitions including the Yehudi Menuhin (1st prize), Henryk Wieniawski (1st prize), and Indianapolis (silver medallist) violin competitions, Soyoung has earned the respect of her peers as a violinist and chamber musician of the highest calibre.
Soyoung is increasingly in demand on the international stage, having performed as soloist with a number of leading orchestras to date, including the Czech National Symphony, Prague Philharmonia, Bilbao Orkestra Sinfonikoa, Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, Orquesta Sinfónica de Galicia, NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra, Russian National Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Geneva Chamber Orchestra, Belgian National Orchestra, Polish National Radio Symphony, Bern Symphony, Trondheim Symphony, Trondheim Soloists, Zurich Chamber Orchestra as well as Franz Schubert Filharmonia in Barcelona.
Her growing list of collaborators includes amongst others Krzyszstof Penderecki, Ivor Bolton, Krzysztof Urbanski, Muhai Tang. As well as with Maxim Vengerov, Eiji Oue and Michal Nesterowicz.
Soyoung frequently collaborates with the Korean Chamber Orchestra, having recorded Piazolla’s Four Seasons and Mendelssohn-Bartholdy’s Concerto for Violin and Piano with them, touring through Asia, Europe, and North America in the process.
Along with Veit Hertenstein and Benjamin Gregor-Smith, she founded the ORION String Trio in 2012, winning both 1st prize and the audience prize at the 2016 “Migros Kulturprozent” Chamber Music Competition in Zurich, and having performed in venues such as London’s Wigmore Hall, Zurich Tonhalle, Stuttgart, Edinburgh, Belfast, and Manchester.
Nowadays (2023) she has formed a new piano trio together with the Spanish pianist Judith Jáuregui and the Swiss/French cellist Nadège Rochat. All three are based in Spain and have had their debuts in the Auditorio Nacional de Música in Madrid as well as in Saragossa, Dijon and San Sebastián and will have their Swiss debut in the coming season in Bellmund.
Based between Barcelona and Seoul, Soyoung studied at the National University of the Arts in South Korea, with Zakhar Bron at the Cologne University of Music and Dance, and at the Zurich University of the Arts.
She plays the J. B. Guadagnini violin (ex- Bückeburg) made in Turin in 1773.
In the last years, Marta Mathéu has catapulted as a reference lyric voice. She performs naturally and accurately the opera, lied and oratorio repertoire, the three primordial pillars of her career. Her growing presence in the opera stages have led her perform very distinct characters, such as Norma (Liceu, 2022) and Berta (Il barbiere di Siviglia, Menorca, 2021). La Contessa from Le nozze di Figaro, Donna Anna (Don Giovanni), Liù (Turandot) and Mimì (La Bohème) are some of the characters of her repertoire.
Her interpretations of Bach under the conducting of Jordi Savall have been lauded in various European theatres (for example, the Philarmonie de Paris). She has sung together with Javier Camarena, Sondra Radvanovsky and Ludovic Tézier.
In the symphonic and oratorio fields she has performed with great conductors such as Rinaldo Alessandrini, Marco Armiliato, Fabio Biondi, Ivor Bolton, Gustavo Dudamel, Sir Neville Marriner, Andrés Orozco-Estrada, Víctor Pablo Pérez, Josep Pons, etc. and with orchestras such as London Philharmonic Orchestra, Oxford Philomusica, Orquestra Simfònica de Barcelona i Nacional de Catalunya, Orquesta de RTVE, Sinfónica de Galicia, Bilbao Orkestra Sinfonikoa, Sinfónica de Navarra, etc.
As a performer of Spanish music, the recording she participated in as Francina, the lead character of the Cançó d’amor i de guerra by Rafael Martínez Valls, received an award. This was the first integral recording of this piece since the one starring Montserrat Caballé in 1974.
Marta Mathéu has received lessons from Ana Luisa Chova, Montserrat Caballé, Elena Obraztsova and Wolfram Rieger and she has performed on the most acclaimed theatres of the world, including the Palau de la Música Catalana, the Teatro Real, the Liceu de Barcelona, the Philharmonie de Paris and the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. She was awarded in the contest Concurs Tenor Viñas for her interpretation of Mozart. She has also been awarded by Juventudes Musicales de España and in the international contests Manuel Ausensi and Montserrat Caballé (Audience Award). Marta Mathéu has made several recordings and since 2014 she is singing teacher at the Conservatori del Liceu.
Photo credits: Marco Mezquida (Mireia Miralles), Soyoung Yoon (Lukasz Rajchert), Marta Mathéu (Michal Novak)
