Viola
Fontys Conservatory offers the following majors from the string instrument family: violin, viola, cello, and double bass. The strings department focuses on intensive training to help students develop in the realms of solo performance, chamber music and orchestral and ensemble playing. The department also aims to help string players find their way in a changing musical world through exciting multidisciplinary collaborations with other music and arts faculties at Fontys. The program has a strong focus on chamber and ensemble playing, with weekly chamber music lessons throughout the Bachelor and yearly examinations and opportunities to perform in the community. The department presents a monthly Strings on Stage concert, allowing our students the opportunity to grow and develop as performers. Other important points of focus are the yearly technical and orchestral parts exams, which including the opportunity to audition for the orchestra academy at the Philharmonie Zuidnederland. This helps students prepare for future orchestral auditions. The program is directed towards helping young string players turn into dedicated and versatile professional musicians.
Teacher
Emlyn Stam
Violist Emlyn Stam is active as a chamber musician, soloist, pedagogue and performance researcher in the Netherlands and internationally. Since 2014 he has been artistic director of the New European Ensemble an international ensemble for contemporary and 20th century music. As a soloist Emlyn Stam has made numerous appearances for Dutch radio and television. He performed concertos with the Amsterdam Symphony Orchestra, Orquestra d’Espinho (Portugal) and the Schönberg Ensemble. Emlyn is an active music researcher and completed his doctorate at the Academy for Creative and Performing Arts at the Leiden University in 2019 with a dissertation entitle In Search of a Lost Language: Performing in Early-Recorded Style in Viola and String Quartet Repertoires. His research focuses on late 19th and early 20th century performance practices.
Audition
Candidates living in the Netherlands/ Belgium/ Western Germany will do a live audition.
Candidates from other countries will do an online audition.
Duration of the live audition is 15/20 minutes.
Please bring your own pianist or accompaniment. If this is really not possible, please contact us.
The audition program should include:
- One etude for viola solo from Mazas, Hoffman, Kreutzer, Hoffmeister, Vieuxtemps.
- A movement from a concerto or sonata at your choice.
- A repertory piece from another style period as in 2.