THE VIRTUOSO CELLO. A RECITAL BY GERMAN CELLIST THOMAS TUESCHEN AND SAVILIAN FELIX RIGG.

Programme to include works by Beethoven, Schumann and Brahms (and maybe more).

Dr Thomas Tueschen is a German cellist and pediatrician. His first teacher, Edgar Hobinka, came from the school of the famous Julius Klengel, who also taught Emanuel Feuermann and Gregor Piatigorsky.  Thomas also studied with Werner Thomas-Mifune, former principal cellist of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra. For more than 30 years Thomas played at the front desk of the Orchestra of the German Pediatricians, but his main musical preoccupations were always chamber music and solo performances.

He is the cellist for the Ensemble Medici string quartet, with whom he has performed and recorded extensively.  As a part time resident of Kenya, he supports the national charity ‘Ghetto Classics´ by teaching and ensemble coaching in two Nairobi slums and by guest performances with the charity’s beneficiaries.  Furthermore, he supports the National Youth Orchestra of Kenya as coach for the cello section.

His cello is by N. F. Vuillaume, from the year 1846.

Most Savilians are familiar with Felix Rigg.  For more recently elected members, it may be noted of this composer, arranger and pianist that he was born into a musical family and, having begun piano lessons at the age of two, wrote his first musical composition – a short Melodie for piano – aged five, upon his bedroom wall.  Some years later, he performed in a masterclass for the visiting eminent pianist Bogdan Krollschow, who advised a future career in forestry.  At Rigg’s London debut recital in 1982, the German musicologist and critic Dr Hubert Pressganger remarked that he’d never heard the young pianist play better.  As to composition, no less an organ than The Times remarked of his Three Pieces For Viola & Triangle´ that “. . . Rigg’s music is actually better than it sounds”.