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About

Esther studied vocal & musical theater at Mozarteum University Salzburg in Austria where she graduated with honors in 2008 and was awarded the Lilli Lehman Medal by the international Mozarteum foundation. 

She sees her creative potential not only in her singing voice, she is also highly active as a festival curator and producer. Since 2014 she has been carrying out various cultural projects as the Weissenhorn Klassik Festival, the Kulturhaltestelle Berlin, and since 2021 also the Giacinto Scelsi Festival Basel. Both as a singer and a producer she dedicates herself to specific topics and narratives and creatively works them up. Her records with Gramola Vienna “Lieder im Volkston” (2011, juxtaposition of german, bohemian and hungarian folk songs) and “Sound of a poem” (2017, jazz arrangements of late-romantic and impressionistic songs) are significant examples of this work. Her objective is to redefine today’s appearance of an artist with multilayered activities and make it fit for the 21st century. She lives and works as a singer and cultural entrepreneur in Berlin, Germany. 

As a singer she has been distinguished with many significant awards, among them the first prize at the Bundeswettbewerb Gesang Berlin and other awards at international competitions in Vienna, Graz and Hamburg. These competition successes were followed by extensive international concert touring and opera productions at the Salzburg State Theatre, Festspielhaus Salzburg, Mainfranken Theater Würzburg and the Norwegian National Opera, collaborating with conductors as Ivor Bolton, Peter Gülke, Markus Poschner, Ola Rudner, Sebastian Weigle among others. Throughout many years of an intense and versatile career, she has gained a high level of experience, which she is happy to share with future singers and music students. She is subsequently active as a guest teacher in Europe and Asia (China Conservatory of Music in Beijing among others).

Esther’s early career had been shaped by classical repertoire mainly around Mozart and the First Viennese School. Quickly she also turned her attention to 20th and 21st century music that were offering artistic freedom through unusual casts, connection to other art forms and direct contact with present time. Her curiosity led her also to deal with Jazz and free improvising. Meanwhile, Esther’s repertoire choice is stylistically broad, but focuses mainly on pieces for small ensemble or solo pieces that make a special sense when matched together.
On Stage

Erik Satie Vexations
Un Théâtre Acoustique

REER PROJECT 

As musicians with a classical background, we have dealt with Erik Satie’s music numerous times over the past years. Satie as an artist is iconic for many musicians today and is considered as one of the pioneers of minimalism, many see an ancestor of ambient music in his music. But this is just one side of Satie and as we started to think about our contribution to this project, we agreed that we would like to dedicate ourselves to other sides of Satie’s highly versatile personality. Satie is not only to be associated with minimalism, Satie is also to be associated with nightlife entertainment, absurdism, dadaism and satire. According to certain sources, Satie could have meant Vexations as an ironic comment to Richard Wagner’s music, or even as a parody of the meaningless virtuosity of the perpetuum mobile genre.

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Off - Record Label

Digital Release: 11.03.2022

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Sound of a Poem 

Esther Kretzinger

Tim Collins / Wayne Darling /

Gerald Endstrasser / Georges-Emmanuel Schneider

Joseph Marx (1882-1964)

Waldseligkeit (Richard Dehmel) 

Selige Nacht (Otto Erich Hartleben)

You are the garden (Anton Wildgans)

arranged by Tim Collins

Claude Debussy (1862-1918)

Green (Paul Verlaine), 

Il pleure dans mon coeur

(Paul Verlaine)

arranged by Tim Collins

Othmar Schoeck (1886-1957)

Sommerabend (Heinrich Heine) 

Warum sind denn die Rosen so blass? (Heinrich Heine), Wo? (Heinrich Heine)

arranged by Gerald Endstrasser

Gerald Endstrasser (*1962) Waldseligkeit (Richard Dehmel)

Bonus Track Wordless

CD, Gramola Vienna

Release: 28.04.2017

Vinyl LP record, Gramola Vienna

Release: 26.01.2018

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Lieder im Volkston

Esther Kretzinger

Andrej Hovrin

Johannes Brahms (1833-1897)

From Six Songs, op. 7 Nos. 4 & 5 (1854); Eight Songs and Romances,

op. 14 No. 8 (1860/61); German Folksongs, WoO 33 Nos. 5, 6, 15, 41, 42 (1894)

Antonín Dvořák (1841-1904)

In Folk Tone.. Four Songs for Voice and Piano, op. 73 (1886)

Béla Bartók (1881-1945)

Nyolc Magyar Népdal / Eight Hungarian Folksongs, Sz. 64, BB. 47 (1907, 1917)

Zoltán Kodály (1882-1967)

Magyar népzene / Hungarian Folkmusic (1924-1964)

CD, Gramola Vienna

Release: 15.04.2011

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