Christian Tetzlaff

"Christian Tetzlaff … body swaying with the music’s passions, fingers dancing near the violin’s bridge, spinning a thread of silvery sound ethereal yet passionate, the dynamics graded with infinite grace...We sat rapt as its melodic line and decorative frills leaped and shimmered up and down the violin’s register. What a superb player Tetzlaff is." (The Arts Desk, April 2012)

"Christian Tetzlaff was the perfect advocate, performing the solo part's virtuosic heroics with phenomenal energy and persuasive conviction, and really bringing the work's inherent lyricism to the fore." (The Strad, November 2011)

“You couldn’t wish for a better exponent today than the German violinist Christian Tetzlaff, with his Protean ability to take on the character of whatever work he is playing. The character here was Slavonic, and from his opening flourish he found a genial sweetness of tone. Even when playing pianissimo and stratospherically high, he still dominated the orchestra.” (The Independent, September 2011)

"As for the soloist Christian Tetzlaff, he again gave that sense of almost reckless intensity that he summoned up in the Brahms concerto a few weeks ago. But equally striking was the intelligence of his playing, the way he registered the myriad threads connecting his sounds to the orchestra’s. The slow processional of the ending, brought to an end with a single peremptory note from Tetzlaff, was a brilliant stroke." (The Telegraph, September 2011)

"That same night, Christian Tetzlaff had set off like a rocket in Brahms's violin concerto. He's an intensely physical soloist, throwing himself into the declamatory phrases like a man following a particularly exacting fitness regime, but equally sensitive to those moments of melting tenderness. He contrived a thrilling balance between cantabile and cutting edge, with a daring line in tiny pianissimos. The way he floated in over the orchestra at the end of the first-movement cadenza was one to treasure. I don't know when I last enjoyed a performance of this concerto so much." (The Observer, August 2011)

"In the first half, Gardner, the BBCSO and Christian Tetzlaff had already had us on the edge of our seats for a Brahms Violin Concerto that will be my benchmark interpretation from now on. The soloist's scorching opening statement, the airy sweetness of his calming serenades, and the heel-stomping dances of the final movement were all breathtaking. Tetzlaff, playing as if his life depended on it, transported his audience from the Hungarian gypsy camp to the salons of Vienna. It was the trip of lifetime." (Independent on Sunday, August 2011)

“This was a beautifully contoured performance, with a chaste, almost otherworldly finish to the slow movement — and I loved how stealthily Tetzlaff stole into the Rondo finale’s gypsy tune.“ (The Times, August 2011)

“This has to be the most extraordinarily intense and dramatic rendition of this great piece I have heard... Tetzlaff’s first statement burst in with startling urgency, like a truth that had to be uttered now or never. Thereafter, every phrase had the same sense of being impelled by an unstoppable inner need.  It was enthralling to hear a well-worn piece so totally re-imagined.” (The Daily Telegraph, August 2011) 

"The soloist was Christian Tetzlaff, who let the music live, breathe and sing with a directness few can equal today. Gardner got off to a low-key start with a sedate account of the introduction, though Tetzlaff's assertive first entry immediately raised the level of the proceedings to the superlative and beyond. Sensational.” (The Guardian, August 2011)

“Soloist Christian Tetzlaff's interpretation wore its technical virtuosity lightly and without any hint of mere display. A highly physical player, his gestures were always the result of his musical impulses, never an illustration of them, and his tone was alive in every note.” (The Guardian, June 2011)

"Soloist Christian Tetzlaff has the kind of technique that makes you forget the difficulty of the piece and simply wonder at the range of expression, the variety of tone and colour at his disposal. While playing, he seemed engaged in an intimate dance with his instrument; in his few moments of silence, he stood like a boxer, tensed for the next round. His sound is big yet not exaggerated; he can play rough, but he also fined things down to a whisper so delicate that it filled the whole hall, turning the heartbreaking melody that opens the second movement into a serenade for lost love. This is a densely structured concerto that in the right hands -Tetzlaff's - becomes a free-flowing fantasy.” (Evening Standard, June 2011)