Daniel Hope named Intendant and Artistic Director of Gstaad Menuhin Festival & Academy beginning November 1, 2025

(June 2024) — Daniel Hope, one of the world’s most sought-after violinists and musical
personalities and Music Director of both the Zurich Chamber Orchestra and New Century
Chamber Orchestra, will take over as the newly elected Intendant & Artistic Director of the
Gstaad Menuhin Festival & Academy on November 1, 2025. He succeeds Christoph Müller,
who will be leaving Gstaad at the end of the 2025 festival after 24 successful years at the helm.
Following a multi-stage and extensive selection process, Hope – who has a long musical
connection both to Gstaad and to Yehudi Menuhin – was elected unanimously by the Board of
Directors of the Gstaad Menuhin Festival & Academy on the recommendation of the appointment
committee.

In addition to his international performance career, since 2004 Hope has focused a good portion
of his time on directing and curating music festivals and concert series, including at the Savannah
Music Festival, the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival and the Philharmonie Essen. He currently
serves as Artistic Director of the Frauenkirche Dresden and President of the Beethoven House in
Bonn. About the new appointment, Aldo Kropf, Chairman of the Board of Directors and the
appointment committee, comments:

“I am thrilled that we have been able to appoint Daniel Hope as Christoph Müller’s successor. He
brings with him a worldwide network and the necessary experience for this demanding role,
which will be a great asset for the festival and the Gstaad Saanenland region. His close connection
to our festival, its founder Yehudi Menuhin, and to the Saanenland will also be extremely valuable
for us.”

Christoph Müller, who will be responsible for artistic direction until the end of the 2025 festival,
adds:

“Daniel Hope is a passionate and successful musician and music educator who will continue to
develop the broad-based program and diversity of the current festival in his own visionary way,
with concert formats reaching new audiences thanks to his many exciting and even
interdisciplinary ideas. He is in every respect the ideal person to lead this festival – which means a
great deal to me and to which I am indebted – into its eighth decade. I am delighted to be able to
place the artistic responsibility of the festival into his hands.”

Hope responds:

“I am delighted to have been offered this wonderful opportunity to shape the future together with
the festival team. The Gstaad Menuhin Festival was the starting point of my relationship with
music: it was here that I had my first ever encounter with classical music as a small child. It was
also where I was allowed to turn the pages for the festival artists from the age of 11, and when I
finally made my official debut at the festival in August 1992, Yehudi Menuhin himself was sitting in
the audience. To summarize: Gstaad is so much a part of my musical DNA that it doesn’t matter
where I am in the world. Music and the Bernese Oberland – for me, this is the perfect symbiosis.”

Hope has also long been a regular performer at the Gstaad Menuhin Festival – named after its
founder, the American violinist and humanitarian, Yehudi Menuhin (1916-1999) – and this season
he will give concerts at the end of July in Saanen and Zweisimmen with the Zurich Chamber
Orchestra and his AIR Ensemble respectively. The programs are those featured on his two latest
Deutsche Grammophon releases: “DANCE!” traces the history of Western dance from medieval
times to the present day, and “Irish Roots” is a follow-up to the violinist’s 2022 PBS
documentary, Celtic Dreams: Daniel Hope’s Hidden Irish History. He begins his directorship as the
Gstaad Menuhin Festival prepares to celebrate its 70th anniversary in 2026. This month, along
with his wife and two children, the violinist relocated from Berlin to Switzerland.

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Daniel Hope: Gstaad Menuhin Festival engagements

July 29
Saanen, Switzerland
Menuhin Festival
Saanen Church
“DANCE!”
Zurich Chamber Orchestra
GLUCK: “Danse des Furies” from Orphée ed Euridice
ANONYMOUS: Lamento di Tristano
HANDEL: Water Music Suite No. 3 in G, HWV 350
DALL’ABACO: Concerto grosso in D, Op. 5, No. 6
CONFORTO: Fandango from L’Endimione
MOZART: Rondo for violin and orchestra in B-flat, K. 269
SCHUBERT: Excerpts from German Dances, D 89 (D 90)
BIZET: Farandole from L’Arlésienne Suite No. 2
BARTÓK: Six Romanian Folk Dances, Sz 56
SCHULHOFF: Alla Tarantella. Prestissimo con fuoco from Five Pieces
TCHAIKOVSKY: Pas de deux from Swan Lake
OFFENBACH: Galop Infernal (Can-can) from Orphée aux enfers
SAINT-SAËNS: Danse macabre, Op. 40
PROKOFIEV: “Dance of the Knights” from Romeo and Juliet
PIAZZOLLA: Escualo

July 30
Zweisimmen, Switzerland
Menuhin Festival
Zweisimmen Church
“Irish Roots”
AIR Ensemble: Simos Papanas, violin; Nicola Mosca, cello; Emanuele Forni, Baroque guitar; Markellos
Chryssicos, harpsichord; Michael Metzler, percussion
IRISH TRADITIONALS: “Cooley’s,” “Seán Frank,” “Fair and Forty,” “The One-Horned Cow,” “Patsy Jouhey’s,”
“Killavil Jig”
ROSEINGRAVE:
Introduction to Scarlatti’s Lessons (arr. by Olivier Fourès)
Fifth Sett (arr. Olivier Fourès)
Suite for harpsichord No. 5 in F minor, V. Gavotte
PURCELL: A New Irish Tune, Z.646
SCARLATTI:
Sonata for harpsichord in B minor, K, 27 (arr. by Olivier Fourès)
Sonata for harpsichord in D minor, K, 141 (arr. by Olivier Fourès)
KUSSER: Arias from Erindo or The Immaculate Love (arr. by Olivier Fourès)
GEMINIANI: “Auld Bob Morrice”
OSWALD: “She’s Sweetest When She is Naked,” “Scotsman Over the Border,” “Murray’s March”
FALCONIERO: Ciaccona
VIVALDI:
Concerto for two violins No. 5 in A, Op. 3, No. 5, RV 519 (from L’estro armonico): Allegro
Trio Sonata in D minor, Op. 1, No. 8, RV 64, I. Preludio
Violin Concerto in B minor, RV 387, “Slip Jig”
O’CAROLAN:
O’Carolan’s Devotion
O’Carolan’s Concerto
IRISH TRADITIONALS: “Codladh an Óighir” (arr. Siobhán Armstrong), “The Waterford Waltz,” “The Red
Haired Boy,” “Coey’s Hornpipe,” “Pingneacha Rúa agus Prás,” “Dublin Streets,” “Dever the Dancer,”
“Connaughtman’ s Ramble,” “The Humors of Castel Bernard”

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© 21C Media Group, June 2024