Christa-Maria Stangorra

“It is a great honour to be able to play in an orchestra of such standing and with such a long tradition. What fascinates me most is the fact that every single player here is an outstanding musician. So when everyone plays together, there is an incredible 'drive', which is the extraordinary character of the orchestra.”

Christa-Maria Stangorra comes from a family in which a lot of music was played. She was so fascinated by her aunt’s violin that she persuaded her parents to give her one when she was only two years old. However, she had to wait two more years until her arms were long enough to start violin lessons. From the beginning, she loved the radiant sound of the violin, which can vary from silvery, clear, and shimmering to dark, warm, and melancholic. Christa-Maria Stangorra studied at the Purcell School for Young Musicians in London, at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg under Tanja Becker-Bender, and under Pavel Vernikov in Sion and Florence. In 2022 she completed her master’s at the Hanns Eisler School of Music Berlin under Ning Feng. She received valuable musical inspiration from master classes held by Daniel Barenboim, Vadim Gluzman, Igor Ozim and Latica Honda-Rosenberg, among others. A recipient of scholarships from the Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes and the Villa Musica Stiftung Rheinland-Pfalz, she has performed as a soloist with the Polish Chamber Philharmonic Orchestra Sopot, the Norddeutsche Philharmonie Rostock, the Staatsorchester Darmstadt, Ensemble Resonanz and the Asian Chamber Orchestra Hong Kong.

For a long time, the violinist was mainly interested in solo and chamber music until she became a scholarship holder at the Karajan Academy in 2021, and was given the opportunity to perform in concerts with the Berliner Philharmoniker. From her very first rehearsal, she was carried away by the sound of the orchestra and Christa-Maria Stangorra had only one wish: to become part of the orchestra. She found her time at the Karajan Academy with concertmaster Krzysztof Polonek as mentor and teacher to be extremely rewarding. After only one year at the Academy, her wish was fulfilled by becoming a member of the Berliner Philharmoniker’s second violin section. Outside her orchestral activities, she likes to relax by travelling, hiking and baking.

The musician plays a violin by Giovanni Francesco Pressenda (1823) owned by the Federal Republic of Germany, on loan from the Deutscher Musikinstrumentenfonds.