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"[Felix Hell]
is a performer of taste and discipline, with a powerhouse technique. "
Pasa
Tempos - October 2007
"The
performances are good assured and technically fine...the instrument is
bright and potent enough for any literature...[Felix Hell] clearly bears
watching. An impressive presentation."
American
Record Guide - September/October 2006
"...his
undoubted talent and old-school American training have left him with a
virtuosic technique capable of tackling all the major romantic and 20th
century repertoire"
MusicWeb International - July 2006
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Felix
Hell was born on September 14,
1985, in Frankenthal/Pfalz, Germany. He took his first piano lesson at
the age of seven, after having heard the C-Major Prelude, WTK-I, of
J.S.Bach. He played it from memory after a few days listening to it and
observing the piano player. Only eight months later, September 1993, he
took his first organ lesson. Already in spring 1994, just 7 months after
his first organ lesson, he participated in the Federal German
competition for young musicians "Jugend musiziert", and
received two First Prizes in organ playing. On Easter 1994, still
eight years old, he was on duty in his first service as a liturgical
organist, playing the organ at a Roman Catholic High Mass. The following
years Felix Hell continued to take First Prizes in the German
competition "Jugend musiziert": 1996 two First Prizes in piano
playing, 1997 two First Prizes in organ playing and in 1999 again two
First Prizes in piano playing. His organ studies Felix pursued, after
initial studies with Eckard Mayer, at the Evangelical University of
Church Music in Heidelberg/Germany with Johannes Michel (organ
literature) and Prof. Christiane Michel (Improvisation). Additional
coaching in this period of his education Felix Hell received in courses
with Professors Martin Lücker, Frankfurt; Pieter van Dijk, Amsterdam;
Oleg Yantchenko (+); Moscow, Wolfgang Rübsam, Chicago; Leo Krämer,
Speyer; Franz Lehrndorfer, Munich; Robert Griffith, Delaware/Ohio;
From the very beginning, Felix Hell's piano teacher has been Prof.
Siegbert Panzer, German State Academy of Music, Mannheim. In
September 1999 Felix Hell enrolled at the Juilliard School, New York,
where he had been awarded a merit-based full tuition scholarship,
studying organ with Matthew Lewis and piano with Fank Levy. Since
September 2001 Felix has been studying, again under full tuition
scholarship, at The Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia under the
tutelage of Dr. John Weaver and Alan Morrison, with additional coaching
by Prof. Martin Jean (Yale University), Prof. Sutherland (Peabody
Conservatory) and a master class with Marie-Claire Alain, Paris.
In May 2004 Felix Hell graduated with the Bachelor of Music, entering
the history of the Curtis Institute of Music as the youngest Organ Major
ever to graduate from this world-famous conservatory. Since September
2004 Felix Hell is enrolled in both the Master of Music and the Artist
Diploma programs at the Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins
University in Baltimore, USA, studying under the guidance of Donald
Sutherland, attending additional courses held by Joan Lippincott,
Princeton, and Gillian Weir, London. From the very beginning Felix
Hell maintained a very busy recital schedule. His first solo appearance
dates back to march 1994, and his first solo concert abroad the soon to
be nine-year old Felix gave in August 1994 in the Great Hall of the
Saratov Conservatory, Russia. Meanwhile Felix Hell has performed about
400 recitals in Germany and abroad: Canada, Australia, New Zealand,
Singapore, Korea, Spain, France, Italy, Russia, Latvia, Iceland, Norway,
Jamaica, and the USA, where he had given more than 250 concerts in 40
states.
He
has been privileged to perform in such prestigious places like:
Passau Cathedral (Hoher Dom zu Passau), Germany; Ulm Cathedral (Ulmer
Muenster), Germany; Cathedral of Hildesheim (Hoher Dom zu Hildesheim),
Germany;Cathedral of St. Mauritius and St. Katharina, Magdeburg,
Germany; Cathedral of St. Peter, Worms, Germany; University of Bochum,
Auditorium Maximum, Germany; Cathedral of St. John the Divine, New York;
National Cathedral of SS. Peter and Paul, Washington D.C.; Basilica of
the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, Washington D.C.; First
Congregational Church, Los Angeles; Broadway Baptist Church, Ft. Worth,
Texas; Spivey Hall, Morrow (Atlanta), Georgia Spreckels Organ at Balboa
Park, San Diego;
Lincoln Center of the Performing Arts (Alice Tully Hall), New York;
Boston Symphony Hall, Boston, Massachusetts; Methuen Memorial Music
Hall, Methuen, Massachusetts; City Hall, Merrill Auditorium, Portland,
Maine; Irvine Auditorium, University of Pennsylvania; Wanamaker Organ,
Philadelphia; Tschaikovskiy Concert Hall, St. Petersburg; Great
Philharmonic Hall, St. Petersburg, Russia; Dome Cathedral, Riga, Latvia;
Melbourne Town Hall, Australia; Sydney Opera House, Australia; Sydney
Townhall, Australia; Adelaide Town Hall, Australia; Nidaros Cathedral,
Trondheim; Bergen Cathedral, Norway
Orchestra performances comprise concerts with the Charleston Symphony
Orchestra, USA, the National Academy Orchestra of Canada under Boris
Brott, and the NEC Philharmony, Boston, USA, under Jens Georg Bachmann.
Felix Hell is member of the American Guild of Organists, the
German Gesellschaft der Orgelfreunde, and the Organ Music
Society of Sydney He holds the position as Organ Artist Associate
at St. Peter's Lutheran Church in Manhattan, New York City. Only
recently he was appointed Distinguished Organist-in-Residence at
the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Felix
Hell has recorded six CDs, critically acclaimed by the public as well as
by experts. His music has been broadcast several times, including a 90
minute solo show, by PIPEDREAMS of Minnesota Public Radio (host: Michael
Barone), as well as by radio stations of Germany, The Netherlands,
Australia, and by the BBC in Great Britain.
He was featured on TV at ABC and NBC, and the German TV stations ARD,
ZDF, SWR, RTL, DW, SAT1, and 3SAT.
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