Maria Dueñas
With her impressive musical expressiveness and technical perfection, María Dueñas has quickly established herself as one of the most sought-after artists of her generation at the age of only 18. At the latest since winning the Menuhin Competition 2021, including the Audience Prize, the Spanish violinist has been in demand worldwide as a soloist and chamber musician. In addition to her performances under conductors such as Gustavo Dudamel, Marek Janowski, Manfred Honeck, Vladimir Spivakov, Vassily Sinaisky, Gustavo Gimeno, Michael Sanderling, Jaime Martín, Mihhail Gerts and Dima Slobodeniouk, María Dueñas is also passionately active as a composer and chamber musician. Jordi Cervelló (b. 1935 in Barcelona) dedicated several solo works to her, which María Dueñas premiered especially in Barcelona, most recently his piece Milstein Caprice.
Born in Granada (Spain), María Dueñas began her musical education at the age of five, studying first at the Hochschule für Musik Carl Maria von Weber in Dresden, before joining the class of acclaimed pedagogue Prof. Boris Kuschnir at the Musik und Kunst Privatuniversität der Stadt Wien and at the Kunstuniversität Graz in 2016.
María Dueñas plays on instruments by Nicolò Gagliano from 1734 and Guarneri del Gesù “Muntz” from 1736, both violins on loan from the Deutsche Stiftung Musikleben and the Nippon Music Foundation, respectively. In addition, as winner of the 2021 Menuhin Competition, Jonathan Moulds is lending her a Stradivarius from his private collection.
