The ensemble
Since 2016, the three-member ensemble Due sopra il Basso has been delighting audiences with early music concert and stage programs. In an unusual formation of two singers and a lutenist, the ensemble performs music from the Renaissance and Baroque periods. At that time, instruments like the lute, the theorbo and the baroque guitar were called “basso continuo” instruments. Hence the name: “Two above the bass” – Due sopra il Basso. Some of the ensemble’s projects involve the participation of bowed bass players in order to make the historical sound even richer and more diverse.
After an exciting and successful first concert season with a program of Italian villanelles and early baroque instrumental pieces, in the summer of 2017 the ensemble recorded the demo CD “ITALIA!”. Another CD production followed in October 2018 with the title “Lieder für ein füstliches Brautpaar” – “Songs for a royal bridal couple”. Its tracklist includes the “Airs de Cour” composed in 1632 by Louys de Moy, Emden’s court lutenist at the time.
Between 2018 and 2020, Due sopra il Basso has toured with their program “Deutschland?”, mixing secular and sacred pieces from the Renaissance and early Baroque.
In 2022, the ensemble received funding from the Neustart Kultur programme for their new project “Die Gaben des Bacchus” – “The gifts of Bacchus”, which enabled them to develop and present a stage performance around the famous god of ecstasy and wine.
For some time now, musician Alma Stolte has been playing regularly on the baroque cello and viola with Due sopra il Basso.
Musicians
Johannes Wieners
Countertenor
Johannes Wieners studied double bass and singing at the Rostock University of Music and Theater. His great interest in contemporary music led him to the Graz University of Art, where he is currently attending the Master’s Program Performance Practice in Contemporary Music with Prof. Holger Falk. . In August 2021 he sang Salvatore Sciarrino’s Studi per l’intonazione del mare as part of the Ostrava Days 2021, and in June 2022 he performed Bernhard Lang’s Songbook II.2 – Retextured with Klangforum Wien.
Jonathan Boudevin
Baritone
Jonathan Boudevin was born in Ales, France in 1987. After graduating from high school in Nantes, he studied musicology at the François Rabelais University in Tours. After an Erasmus year in Rostock, during which he received his first singing lessons, he decided to study singing at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Rostock. During his studies he appeared in several productions at the Theater Vorpommern and after graduating in 2015 he began making music with the Berlin soloist ensemble for contemporary music PHÖNIX16.
Max Hattwich
Lute, Theorbo and Baroque Guitar
Max Hattwich studied historical performance practice on the lute, theorbo and baroque guitar at UdK Berlin and guitar at the hmt-Rostock guitar. He plays passionately on the entire range of lute instruments from the Middle Ages to the High Baroque. He regularly plays baroque operas at various opera houses throughout Germany, has a teaching position at the UdK-Berlin as an accompanist in Deborah York’s singing class and is a welcome guest with ensembles such as the Lautten Compagney Berlin, the Rundfunk Sinfonie Orchestra Berlin, the Kammerakademie Potsdam and the German Symphony Berlin Orchestra.
Alma Stolte
Bassviol and Baroque Cello
During her school years, Alma Stolte won prizes in the Jugend Musiziert and Unart competitions. She studied cello and instrumental pedagogy in Dresden with Prof. KV Matthias Bräutigam and was a recipient of the Deutschlandstipendium scholarship. She received her first baroque cello lessons from Ludger Rémy, and she was able to delve into the instrument in 2017 and 2018 at the Amsterdam Conservatory with Viola de Hoog. Since October 2019 she has been deepening her studies in baroque cello and viola da gamba with Lea Rahel Bader at the Berlin University of the Arts.
