New Signing: Jonian Ilias Kadesha

We are delighted to welcome violinist Jonian Ilias Kadesha to our roster. Jonian completed his Masters at the Kronberg Academy in 2020 and was a prize-winner at the Young Classical Artists Trust (YCAT) International Auditions in London in 2018. Described by the Süddeutsche Zeitung as ‘a huge talent ... there is an element of pure genius in this young man’, Jonian has boundless energy and imagination.

 For his first album on Linn, Jonian will record a high-flying programme of solo violin pieces spanning five centuries. This includes works by Biber, Bach, Schnittke, Kurtág and Auerbach, plus Winkelman’s Ciaccona for Violin Solo which receives its first commercial recording here.

Jonian says: I am truly honoured to join the legendary Linn Records. This album is perhaps to some degree a reflection of the rather strange times we are living in. These are works that I started exploring to a deeper level due to the lack of real musical dialogue; playing chamber music during the first months of the pandemic was impossible. This collection of music is about a lonely path, a lonely walk. Bach’s D minor Partita, the central work of this programme, ends with the formidable and monumental Ciaccona, which will be followed by a contemporary Ciaccona, written by the Swiss composer Helena Winkelman. In addition there will be other 20th - and 21st -century pieces by Alfred Schnittke, György Kurtág and Lera Auerbach, all heavily inspired by Bach’s music. I couldn’t resist adding one of the oldest pieces of music ever written for solo violin: the angelic and absolutely mesmerising Passacaglia by Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber.

Look out for the recording in 2022.