Luca Braga
Luca Braga studied violin at the Giuseppe Verdi Conservatory in Milan and earned his Diploma studying under Umberto Oliveti in 1985. He undertook further study with Felice Cusano and later with Zinaida Gilels and Alexandre Brussilowski, attending courses, seminars, and master classes. He continued his studies at the International Academy of Music in Novara where he achieved brilliant results under the guidance of Maja Jokanovich and received a study grant for being the top student. For chamber music, he specialized in sonata repertoire under Mariana Sirbu and in string quartet studies with Franco Rossi, again receiving study grants or awards for merit.
Founder of the Quartetto Harmòs and the Olmutz Ensemble, he was won numerous prizes and awards in national and international chamber music competitions. In 1994 he won the national competition for a chair on the faculty of musical conservatories as a teacher of violin and chamber music. He holds the Chair of Chamber Music at the Vicenza Conservatory of Music where he also teaches violin in the final two years of the experimental programme.
As soloist and chamber musician, he has been the guest of prestigious concert associations in Italy, Austria, Switzerland, France, Spain, Great Britain, the Czech Republic, Germany, Luxemburg, Poland, Portugal, Africa, South America, and Japan. For many concert seasons he has performed in duo with Lucia Pittau at venues in Italy and abroad, such as the world-famous Sibelius Accademy in Helsinki, the Scuola Normale Superiore of Pisa, and Les Rencontres de Louvergny (France). He recently recorded Martucci and Sgambati's complete Opera per violin e piano with Pittau on the Tactus label to critical acclaim in specialist publications (awarded four stars in Musica, July 2006) and has made numerous other recordings and radio broadcasts. He has collaborated as Concertmaster with important Italian orchestras.
Since 2000 he has been a member of the Mantua Chamber Orchestra with which he has sometimes performed as Principal Violin. He is Principal Violin of the Quartet of the Mantua Chamber Orchestra with which he has performed extensively and inaugurated the the Haydn celebrations in 2009. In 2002 he was invited by Enrico Dindo to perform with I Solisti di Pavia, an ensemble with which he still regularly collaborates as a soloist, concertmaster, or first violin. As a very active chamber musician, he performs with various Italian organizations and has collaborated with Enrico Dindo, Danilo Rossi, Luca Ranieri, Marco Rogliano, Alberto Bocini, Giampaolo Pretto, Gabriele Cassone, Stefania Redaelli, and Paolo Bordoni.
After several events in the 1990s, he went on to further his knowledge of baroque and classical performance techniques with original instruments for about a year by attending seminars and master classes with renowned musicians such as Antonio Moccia, Reinhard Goebel, Monica Huggett, Christopher Hogwood, and Franz Bruggen and by collaborating with some of the most important groups on the international scene including Giardino Armonico, Kammerorchester Basel, and I Barocchisti RSI. His lively musical inquisitiveness has led him to probe other musical genres in noteworthy moments of collaboration with great musicians such as Ray Charles, Stevie Wonder, Dollar Brand, and Elio e le Storie Tese.