Meet The Team 2026

Juan María Braceras is a highly versatile violinist with a multifaceted career that spans a wide range of musical genres and disciplines. He began studying the violin at the age of 11 in Natal, Brazil, and has as guidance Osvaldo D’Amore, Rucker Bezerra and Alexandre Casado. At 18, he was appointed first violin of the Orquestra Sinfônica da Bahia (OSBA) in Salvador.

In 2010 he graduated with “Distinction” from the Haute École de Musique de Genève, where he studied with Mme. Margarita Piguet-Karafilova and M. Gabor Takacs in Chamber Music. He later completed in 2014 his Master’s in Performance at the Hochschule für Musik Basel under Mme. Adelina Oprean and obtained also his Soloist Diploma in 2017 in Amandine Beyer’s class and Adelina Oprean’s.

He has participated in prestigious festivals and masterclasses with artists such as Alberto Lysy, Pavel Vernikov, Sidney Hart, and Ana Chumachenco, and has been a finalist and winner of national competitions for young musicians in Brazil. His discography includes diverse genres such as Brazilian popular music and Cuban Afro-jazz (Zamazú), in addition to composing for the fusion group Puchero, blending Tango, Rock, Funk, Techno, and Pop.

He has collaborated with renowned Brazilian artists such as Caetano Veloso, Carlinhos Brown, Gilberto Gil, Geraldo Azevedo, Sivuca, and others, and played for eight years in the Mariachi band “Quetzal.”

In addition to his performance career, he has played an important role in mentoring young musicians. At the age of 18, he was an assistant professor at the Universidade Federal da Bahia, taught at the Geneva Conservatory, and worked within the Neojiba youth orchestras system. He has also taught at the Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst Wien and served as a musician and coach at the Verbier Festival. He was a professor at the Royal Conservatory of Brussels.

Currently, he performs with the Orquesta Típica de Tango Silencio and engages in chamber music with artists such as Dana Ciocarlie, Christoph Coin, Plamena Nikitassova, the Mosaïques Quartet, Pablo Márquez, among others. He is also part of the ensembles TORO with Nathan Matchin.

He serves as Founder Director together with Federico Bosco of the Eulirio Verein and has developed projects at iconic locations such as Sutra House and Château de Promenois, where he created the Stage de Musique Promenois, a program designed for young musicians that combines top-tier training with a unique cultural experience.

In the realm of dance, he has collaborated with choreographers such as Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker (Rosas), Johanna Heusser, and Timo Paris, contributing to the creation of innovative dance works.

Throughout his career, he has performed with renowned ensembles such as Kammerorchester Basel, Geneva Camerata, Basel Sinfonietta, Anima Eterna, Gstaad Festival Orchestra, and many others. He currently plays a Jacques Bocquay, Vieux Paris, 1718 violin, on loan from Stiftung Pirolo.

I am a passionate Shiatsu Therapist, running my own practice since 2017. My journey in Shiatsu and Qigong has taken me across Switzerland, the UK, Germany, and Austria, where I have developed my skills and deepened my understanding of holistic well-being.

Since the inception of Juan and the Stage de Music project, I have been actively involved in supporting young musicians. My focus is on helping them develop body awareness and equipping them with simple exercises to stay grounded during their challenging journeys. I aim to guide them in caring for their body, mind, and spirit, fostering resilience and harmony in their artistic endeavors.

Anna Gebert is a sought-after chamber musician, teacher, concertmaster and baroque violinist. Her repertoire includes music from early baroque to contemporary.

She is currently Professor of Chamber Music at the Basel Academy of Music and Professor of Violin at the Zurich University of the Arts.

She performs at chamber music festivals and teaches masterclasses in many European countries and the USA.

At the age of 15 she was accepted into the Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra, two years later she was a founding member of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra.

After the Karajan Academy and a year of full employment with the Berlin Philharmonic, Anna Gebert was in 2007 appointed concertmaster of the Gürzenich Orchestra in Cologne and subsequently of the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra in Norway until 2019. At the same time, she studied education and psychology and taught at the University of Trondheim.

As concertmaster and section leader she has appeared with over 25 major European opera and symphony orchestras, including the London Symphony Orchestra, Bavarian State Opera, BR Symphony Orchestra, Stockholm Philharmonic, Helsinki Philharmonic, Frankfurt Museum Orchestra, HR Frankfurt, Philharmonia Zurich, Oslo Barokkanerne and Helsinki Baroque Orchestras. Her operatic repertoire includes over 60 operas.

After starting to play the violin at the age of 4 taught by her mother, her first teachers included Zinaida Gilels and Zoria Chikmurzaeva. She studied with Igor Bezrodny in Helsinki, Magdalena Rezler in Freiburg im Breisgau, postgraduate studies with Ana Chumachenco in Munich, with Miriam Fried and Paul Biss in Bloomington, Indiana, while studying baroque violin with Stanley Ritchie and Walter Reiter, who remains an important mentor for her to this day. She plays a violin by Joseph Gagliano from
1794.

Anna Gebert shapes her teaching with a great deal of empathy and a holistic understanding of human psychology. The experiences of each person and their individual paths are to be taken into account as well as the questions into which we must first live:

“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day
into the answer.”

― Rainer Maria Rilke

Anton Kernjak comes from an Austrian family with Slovenian background. He studied at the Mozarteum University in Salzburg and later attended concert classes with Rudolf Buchbinder at the Basel „Musikhochschule“, where he graduated with distinction. He was greatly influenced by his studies with the Hungarian musician Ferenc Rados and by master classes with György Kurtág at the IMS International Musicians Seminars in Prussia Cove, UK. 

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Anton Kernjak has received several awards and was a prize-winner at the international Johannes Brahms piano competition in Austria. 

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An accomplished chamber musician, he has performed with different duo and trio partners throughout Europe, in Canada, the USA and Japan. Past appearances were at the Tonhalle Zurich, the WDR Cologne, Wigmore Hall, London and Carnegie Hall, New York. He was also appeared at the Lucerne Festival, the World Music Days in Luxembourg, the Kunstfest „pelerinages“ in Weimar, the European Music Month in Basel, the Davos Music Festival, the Ittinger Pfingstkonzerte, the Bodensee-Festival, the WDR Chamber Music Series in Cologne and the Festival international de Musique de Chambre Domaine Forget in Canada and the Sermoneta Festival near Rome. 

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Anton Kernjak has formed a duo with cellist Anita Leuzinger a number of years ago and regularly collaborates with Heinz Holliger. Other chamber music partners include Ursula Holliger, Thomas Demenga, Hanna Weinmeister, Muriel Cantoreggi, Geneviève Strosser and Silvia Simionescu. In addition to the classical-romantic repertoire, his artistic interests focus on contemporary music. 

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Anton Kernjak teaches chamber music at the Basel „Musikhochschule“.

Roger Helou was born in Buenos Aires in 1978. He realized early on that he had a passionate interest in improvising in various styles of popular music. Since then, he has devoted himself to studying arranging and practicing traditional tango.

At the “Conservatorio Manuel de Falla” he studied piano and organ with Enrique Rimoldi. In 1998 he moved to Europe to the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, where he specialized in medieval keyboard instruments and baroque music with Jean Claude Zehnder.

He then turned back to tango and founded the tango orchestra “SILENCIO” in 2001, of which he is the leader, pianist and arranger. He celebrates successes at tango festivals all over Europe.

In Buenos Aires, Roger Helou was part of the legendary Cuarteto Cedrón as an arranger and pianist. His work with Juan Cedrón has been recorded in various CD productions (2004-2016).
As an orchestral arranger, he has written works for various productions, including the Thüringer Symphoniker, the Sinfónica Patagonia and the Orquesta Nacional de Música Argentina “Juan de Dios Filiberto”.

Double bassist Federico Abraham was born in Mendoza, Argentina, and now lives in Basel.

He studied classical music in his hometown in Argentina. Later, he studied early music at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, jazz at the Basel Jazz School, and music education at the Zurich University of the Arts.

He works as a freelance double bassist in the fields of early music, classical music, jazz, and tango. He performs regularly with orchestras such as La Cetra Basel, the Zurich Chamber Orchestra, the Orchestra of Europe, Il Profondo, Capriccio, the Basel Chamber Orchestra, Capella Gabetta, La Chapelle Ancienne, Ensemble Artaserse, and Ensemble Orlando Fribourg.

Numerous tango concerts with "martes_tango" and "Orquesta Silencio" have taken him throughout Europe, as well as Argentina and Lebanon. Since 2018, he has led his own jazz project, the Federico Abraham Quartet. He has been teaching at the Windisch Music School since 2019.

Maxime is just as ease playing in a big orchestra as he is with a small group of musicians. He continues to push his work further and further, probing tango and exploring various forms of improvisation… and composition too. He is fond of the relationship he has with tango dancing and with the dancers onstage. Certain projects he collaborates on require the musicians to become actors and to develop their stage presence. Maxime enjoys this challenge, and is involved both in theatre andperformance art. He likes playing offbeat music, whilst keeping a traditional touch to hisstyle.

Maxime’s craving to play with other musicians and to explore other artistic spheres, combined with his sensitivity to the world around him, makes his music poignant and radiant.

Born in 1983 in Puy en Velay (France), Maxime began playing music at the age of six. He started playing the accordian when he was seven. At the age of eighteen he discovered tango and the bandoneon, thanks to Hervé ESQUIS. He immediately felt that this form of music and this unusual instrument were both absolutely essential to him as a musician.

He continued studying music at Saint-Etienne’s music academy alongside Philippe BOURLOIS, the two men forging a close relationship throughout Maxime’s music studies and right into his professional career as a confirmed musician. He obtained his music diploma (DEM) and went on to be nominated as laureate in 2009 amongst the gold medalists before perfecting his music studies with an advanced diploma in 2010.

He then continued training in musicology, music analysis and composition, and he wrote a dissertation on Igor STRAVINSKY'S «Rite of Spring».

Maxime has participated in Master Classes with renowned musicians such as Daniel BREL (Bandoneon / Tango), William SABATIER (Tango / Bandoneon), Marcel LOEFFLER (Jazz / Accordeon) and the internationally renowned accordeon concert artist, Yuri SHISHKIN.

He has also performed in "The Threepenny" Opera (Kurt WEILL) at Tours’ Grand Theatre.

For four years he played the accordion with the group DoÏna Quintet, performing jazz, klezmer, tango and improvised music. They released an album in May 2011 : "Cerno More".

Maxime has been playing the bandoneon with the group "Roulotte Tango" since 2006, directed by Julien BLONDEL. With them he has toured abroad to Germany, Turkey, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, Belgium, Russia, Luxembourg and the overseas territories of France. As a member of the group "Roulotte Tango", Maxime regularly collaborates with tango dancers. In 2011 he travelled to South Korea with the dancer / choreographer Odile GHEYSENS/in-SENSO to perform an improvised danse and music piece: "PAVOT Tango Addict".

He played in the "Gran Tipica Paris" with the pianist Roger HELOU and performs with thevery in-vogue tango orchestra, "Silbando".

Maxime is in a new project the "Cuarteto Entre Dos", for milongas and concerts (France, Poland and Italy).

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He played as a solist with the "Symphonic Orchestra of the Opera of Saint-Étienne"

Barbara Doll, a native of Munich, is a versatile musician whose playing is characterized by personality and character. Her intensive study of historical performance practice informs her interpretations, even on modern instruments. As a chamber musician and soloist, she performs internationally as both a violinist and a violist. Since 2014, she has been Professor of Violin at the Basel Academy of Music, having previously held a professorship at the Bern University of the Arts since 2004. She regularly gives international masterclasses and is invited to serve as a juror at national and international competitions. Her teachers include legendary musicians such as Ana Chumachenko, David Takeno, Sándor Végh, Thomas Brandis, and György Sebök. She is a prize winner of the International Schubert Competition Graz and the Kuhmo International Duo Competition. As concertmaster, she has appeared with, among others, the English Chamber Orchestra, the Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, the Zurich Chamber Orchestra, the Munich Chamber Orchestra, and the Basel Chamber Orchestra. For many years she played in the Chamber Orchestra of Europe under the direction of Claudio Abbado and Nikolaus Harnoncourt. Her chamber music and solo activities have taken her to venues such as Wigmore Hall and the Barbican in London, the Chamber Music Hall of the Berlin Philharmonie, and the Auditorio Nacional in Madrid. Since 2014, she has been a member of the ARIA Quartet. As a soloist, she has performed with orchestras including the English Chamber Orchestra and the European Union Chamber Orchestra. Numerous CD, radio, and television recordings attest to her artistic achievements.

The Argentian soprano, Maria Cristina Kiehr, born to Danish descendents, received her early musical training in Argentina. She studied the violin as a child, in the city of Tandil in Argentina, but at the age of 17, she discovered her soft, amazing soprano and her love of Baroque music. The discovery led to a fast change: After only a year of singing lessons, in 1983, she went to Europe, to the leading institute in the revolution seeking authenticity in the performance of Early Music: the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, and studied under René Jacobs. Later she said: “he is the musician who has had the most influence on me”. At the same time she took courses in vocal technique with Eva Krasnai.

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Maria Cristina Kiehr is an all-European artist, and Switzerland is still her home. Kiehr is married to a cellist, Orlando Theuler. From Basel, she travels to performances in many countries, with the best conductors in the field. She is incontestably one of today’s leading vocal artists in the field of Baroque music and has appeared throughout the world in concerts and recordings with celebrated conductors, like René Jacobs, Jordi Savall, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Philippe Herreweghe, Frans Brüggen, Gustav Leonhardt, Konrad Junghänel, and with orchestras and ensembles specializing in the Baroque music field, as Concerto Vocale Leipzig, La Fenice, Cantus Cölln, Ensemble Vocal Européen, Hespèrion XX, Elyma, Nederlands Kamerkoor, Concerto Köln, Ensemble 415, etc.

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Maria Cristina Kiehr is particularly interested in early Baroque music. She is co-founder of the ensembles “La Colombina”, “Daedalus” and “Concerto Soave”. From the start of her career, she was attracted by integration as a singer alongside other singers and musicians, within the polyphonic texture. Later she moved to a somewhat different phase, and is turning more to the solo route.

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In 1988 Maria Cristina Kiehr made her opera début in Innsbruck in Cavalli’s Giasone under René Jacobs. She has also sung in L’Incoronazione di Poppea, Orontea, and Dido and Aeneas (Purcell) under René Jacobs, Dafne (Gagliano), L’Orfeo (Monteverdi) and Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria (Monteverdi) under Gabriel Garrido, as well as the title role in Dorillo in Tempe (Antonio Vivaldi) under Gilbert Bezzina and Il schiavo di sua moglie (Provenzale) under Toni Florio. Her operatic repertoire encompasses also works by Georg Philipp Telemann (Orpheus), Blow (Venus y Adonis), Glück (Orphée et Euridice), Cesti (L’Orontea), Haydn (Orlando Palladino); she has also recorded most of these works.

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Maria Cristina Kiehr sang the part of Mary Magdalen in Antonio Caldara’s oratorio Maddalena ai piedi di Cristo and took part in the new recording of Monteverdi’s Vespro della Beata Vergine, both under René Jacobs, and both of which were greeted with universal acclaim.

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One example of this new career path is a wonderful CD containing motets by Monteverdi, “Pianto della Madonna.” Another example is her new CD, with the same musicians, devoted to Sicilian composer Sigismondo D’India, also from the early Baroque period

Federico Bosco completed his piano studies with distinction at the Turin Conservatory under Claudio Voghera and continued his studies with Andrea Lucchesini in Pinerolo, Filippo Gamba in Padua and Adrian Oetiker in Basel. He also studied conducting at the Basel University of Music with Rodolfo Fischer, who invited him to be his assistant for Buenos Aires Lirica.

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He always dedicated himself to chamber music, his preferred discipline. He was honored by the Basel University of Applied Sciences in 2018 for his consistently outstanding achievements and his great and unwavering commitment to serving the students and the university. He won 1st prizes at the “Salieri-Zinetti Chamber Music Competition” in Verona, the “Sandro Fuga Competition” in Turin and the “Orpheus Competition” in Bern.

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In 2006, he made his debut with the Swiss Youth Symphony Orchestra in the Paul Klee Auditorium in Bern (Mozart's Jeunehomme) and a year later with the Basel Symphony Orchestra (Bartók 1). He performed with the Orchestra of the Turin Conservatory and the Philharmonic Orchestra of the Theater für Niedersachsen Hildesheim/Hannover. As a soloist and chamber musician he has given recitals throughout Europe.

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Federico Bosco is in great demand as a musical partner and accompanist. Regularly invited to festivals, master classes and competitions, he plays with musicians such as Nora Chastain, Hariolf Schlichtig, Danjulo Ishizaka, Daniel Gaede, Silvia Simionescu, Troels Svane, Conradin Brotbek, Adelina Oprean, Francis Gouton, Igor Keller, Beatriz Blanco, Lisa Rieder. He took part in master classes with musicians such as Leonidas Kavakos, Steven Isserlis, Philippe Griffin, Jean-Jacques Kantorow and singers such as Margreet Honig, Thomas Allen, Christine Schäfer, Michaela Schuster and Christiane Iven.

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He has appeared on renowned stages such as the Lucerne Festival, the Gstaad Menuhin Festival, the Salzburg Chamber Music Festival, the Auditorium and Palau de la Música in Barcelona, the Auditorium Nacional in Madrid, the Fondazione Lingotto Musica in Turin, the Rossini Theater in Pesaro, the Teatro Calderón in Valladolid, the Granada Festival, the Swiss Chamber Music Festival in Adelboden, the Malta International Arts Festival and others.

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In 2016, he released his first CD with cellist Beatriz Blanco, which contains the complete works for cello and piano by Chopin and unpublished pieces by his friend Franchomme. In 2022, the duo released their second album, with works by Hindemith, Debussy and Webern.

Federico Bosco worked for two seasons at the Theater für Niedersachsen Hannover as an assistant and conductor and for opera productions at the Theater St. Gallen and with the Basel Chamber Orchestra under the direction of Giovanni Antonini.

Since 2018, he has been a supervisor for keyboard instruments at the Basel University of Music, leads the workshop In and around the piano and since 2023, he has coordinated the very popular concert series of the piano specialist group “Mittagskonzerte”.

Ekachai began his first cello lesson in Thailand at the age of fifteen. 

His musical studies brought him to many different countries including Singapore, the United States and Switzerland.

His teachers were Apichai Liamthong, Gudula Urban, Martin Grund, Li-wei Qin, Amit Peled, Thomas Demenga, Christophe Coin and Petr Skalka.
 

Ekachai enjoys a wide spectrum of different music, from chamber music to solo, from early music to contemporary and rock. He is currently a member of Ensemble Sonorità, Girandola Consort, Ensemble Quadrel, Van der Waals and Cell of Hell.
 

Since 2012 he has been performing regularly with Camerata Zürich,
Gstaad Festival Orchester, Basler Festival Orchester and as a principal cellist in Kammerorchester Basel, Geneva Camerata, Basel Sinfonietta, Kammerorchester I Tempi and Le Cercle de l’Harmonie.

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