Sebastian Manz, international soloist, chamber musician and Principal Clarinet of the SWR Symphony Orchestra, celebrated his big breakthrough in 2008 at the ARD International Music Competition in Munich where he received first prize in the clarinet category, which had not been awarded in this category for 40 years, as well as the coveted audience prize and other special prizes. Before that, he won the German Music Competition with his piano partner Martin Klett. Since then he has received the ECHO KLASSIK three times for outstanding CD recordings and the coveted Emerging Artist Award in New York. For his album A Bernstein Story, released in 2019, he received the OPUS KLASSIK in the category "Classic without borders" in October 2020.
In addition to solo engagements throughout Europe (including with the Deutsche Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz, the Nagoya Philharmonic Orchestra and the National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland), he will return to the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in the USA for several concerts during the season. With his chamber music partners Franziska Hölscher, Felix Klieser, Tanja Tetzlaff, Dag Jensen, Wen Xiao Zheng and Dominik Wagner, he will be heard in numerous places with the Beethoven Septet. With ensembles such as the Boulanger Trio, the Vision String Quartet, the Armida Quartet and his longstanding musical partners Herbert Schuch, Maximilian Hornung, Martin Klett and Sebastian Studnitzky, Sebastian Manz is a welcome guest on the renowned podiums and is performing among others in the Alte Oper Frankfurt, the Festspielhaus Baden-Baden, the Stadtcasino Basel and the Liederhalle Stuttgart, as well as at various festivals such as the Franconian Summer, the Lake Constance Festival and the Schwetzinger Festival.
Sebastian Manz regularly demonstrates his enthusiasm for arranging and composing in concerts and within his discography, which has won numerous awards. The CD A Bernstein Story (Berlin Classics), released in August 2019, which he recorded together with the jazz musician Sebastian Studnitzky, contains arrangements and original compositions by the musicians and inspires both the classical and the jazz music scene. The Mannheimer Morgen newspaper described the album as “a bubbling laboratory with musically highly inspiring experiments” and certified “limitless listening pleasure”. In May 2020 the CD Father Copland with the Württemberg Chamber Orchestra Heilbronn under Case Scaglione was released by Berlin Classics; The new album with the clarinet concertos by Carl Nielsen and Magnus Lindberg was also released by Berlin Classics in early September 2020 and received enthusiastic reviews. Here Magnus Lindberg himself stands at the conductor's podium for his concert. In spring 2022 his current recital CD with works by Johannes Brahms and Robert Schumann, which he recorded together with the pianist Herbert Schuch, was released on the Berlin Classics label.
As the grandson of the Russian violinist Boris Goldstein, the son of two pianists, born in Hanover in 1986, found his musical roots in his German-Russian family home. At the age of six Sebastian Manz sang in the boys' choir, first learned to play the piano but soon concentrated on the clarinet. Ever since he first heard Benny Goodman's recording of Carl Maria von Weber's E flat major Concerto, he has been fascinated by the instrument. None other than Sabine Meyer and Rainer Wehle are among his most important teachers and supporters.
Changes and alterations require prior consultation with Grunau & Paulus Music Management.