German-French cellist Nicolas Altstaedt is renowned worldwide for his creativity and versatility, in his captivating performances of repertoire on both modern and gut strings.
Awarded the Credit Suisse Young Artist Award in 2010, he performed the Schumann concerto in a highly acclaimed debut with the Vienna Philharmonic under Gustavo Dudamel at the Lucerne Festival. Since then he has performed regularly with leading orchestras worldwide such as the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra, Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra, Czech Philharmonic, Finnish Radio Symphony, Melbourne and New Zealand Symphony Orchestras working with conductors Vladimir Ashkenazy, Sir Neville Marriner, Sir Roger Norrington, Sir Andrew Davis, Andrey Boreyko, Vladimir Fedosseyev, Thomas Hengelbrock, Thomas Dausgaard, Lahav Shani, Emmanuel Krivine, Gustavo Gimeno, Dima Slobodeniouk, Fabien Gabel, Giovanni Antonini and Andrea Marcon amongst many others.
In 2012 Nicolas has been chosen by Gidon Kremer to become his successor as the new artistic director of the Lockenhaus Chamber Music Festival and in 2014, Adam Fischer asked him to follow in his footsteps as Artistic Director of the Haydn Philharmonie. In recital, Nicolas performs solo and with partners Fazil Say and Alexander Lonquich in world’s most prestigious venues, such as London Wigmore Hall, Amsterdam Concertgebouw and New York Carnegie Hall. As a chamber musician, Nicolas regularly plays with Janine Jansen, Vilde Frang, Pekka Kuusisto, Antoine Tamestit, Lawrence Power, Jonathan Cohen and the Quatuor Ébène performing regularly at Salzburg Mozart and Summer Festival, Verbier, Utrecht, BBC Proms, Lucerne, Gstaad, Musikfest Bremen, Schleswig-Holstein, Rheingau and Stavanger.
Nicolas regularly premieres new music and performs with composers like Thomas Ades, Jörg Widmann, Matthias Pintscher, Bryce Dessner, Nico Muhly and Fazil Say. To date his recordings of cello concerti by Joseph Haydn, Robert Schumann and György Ligeti have been acclaimed worldwide. His recording of cello concertos by Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, which he also performed at the 2016 Maribor Festival, won the 2017 BBC Music Magazine Concerto Award.
