Wolfgang David, Violinist - Friends

Rainer Küchl

Rainer Küchl was born in Waidhofen an der Ybbs, Lower Austria in August 1950. He began to play the violin at the age of eleven and from 1964 until 1970 he studied at the Music Academy of Vienna with Professor Franz Samohyl. In 1971 he became Konzertmeister of the Vienna State Opera Orchestra and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra where he is now Principal among the orchestra's leaders.

As a soloist he has performed with many of the world's leading orchestras and conductors, including Karl Boehm, Leonard Bernstein, Claudio Abbado and Riccardo Muti. For the centenary of the death of Brahms in 1997 he played in the Double Concerto at a concert in Hamburg with the VPO under Sir Simon Rattle.

Rainer Küchl has received numerous honours and prizes. In 1973 he was awarded the Mozart Interpretation Award of the Mozart Society of Vienna; in 1985 the Salzburg Golden Order of Merit and in 1988 the Austrian Cross of Honour for Science and the Arts. In 1994 he received the Grosse Ehrenzeichen fuer Verdienste um die Republik Oesterreich.

In 1973 he founded the Küchl Quartett - known now as the Wiener Musikverein Quartett - which continues a long and distinguished tradition of string quartets founded by Philharmonic concertmasters, including the Rosé, Schneiderhan and Barylli Quartets. The Musikverein Quartett have made many celebrated recordings and since 1976 they have had their own concert series in the Brahmssaal of the Musikverein.

Rainer Küchl plays a 1725 Stradivari, the 'Chaconne', with kind permission of the Austrian National Bank.