CV

Wolfgang Kogert is an extremely versatile and meticulous interpreter. His repertoire extends from the Robertsbridge Codex (1360) up to the most contemporary music.

He has worked in very close association with many composers such as Friedrich Cerha, Jean-Pierre Leguay, Benoît Mernier, Younghi Pagh-Paan, Karlheinz Essl, Klaus Lang, Wolfgang Mitterer, Thomas Lacôte and Zsigmond Szathmáry.

In conjunction with the Vienna ORF Radio Symphony Orchestra, as the soloist he premiered the organ concertos by Bernd Richard Deutsch and Thomas Amann in the Vienna Musikverein. In 2020 he played the world premiere of »tönendes licht.« organ and orchestra by Klaus Lang together with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra for the new organ in St. Stephan’s Cathedral in Vienna.

His recital work covers appearances at festivals such as Wien Modern, the Bach Festival in Leipzig, the Hildebrandt Festival in Naumburg, the Scelsi Festival in Basel, the Printemps des Arts Nantes and the orgel-mixturen Sankt Peter in Cologne.

As a soloist, he has held appearances at the Vienna Konzerthaus, at the Moscow International House of Music, at the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels, at the Stavanver Konserthus, at the Tokyo Opera City Concert Hall and at the Aichi Arts Center in Nagoya.

He has been invited to organ recitals in churches like Notre-Dame in Paris, Münster Cathedral as well as in Oslo, Prague, Milan, Athens and Riga.Kogert

Kogert has worked together with many orchestras, e.g. the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, the Camerata Salzburg or the Tonkünstler Orchestra in Lower Austria as well as with conductors such as Andrés Orozco-Estrada, Wayne Marshall, Vladimir Fedoseyev, Kristjan Järvi, Cornelius Meister, Marin Alsop and Vladimir Ashkenazy. For chamber music programes he collaborated among others with the Klangforum Wien and the Bachchor Salzburg.

Wofgang Kogert was born in Vienna in 1980 and received his training in his native city, as well as in Stuttgart and Detmold. As the only Austrian to date, he won the Internationale Wedstrijd Musica Antiqua in Bruges in 2006, and in 2013 he was Artist in Residence at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris.

In 2012, Kogert was appointed organist of the tradition-steeped Court Chapel in Vienna, where he performs with the Vienna Hofmusikkapelle, consisting of members of the Vienna Philharmonic, the Vienna Boys’ Choir and the Men’s Choir of the Vienna State Opera.

Kogert is the curator of the Schuke Organ (1983) of the ORF Radio Culture House in Vienna and the First Guest Organist of the historical Pflieger Organ (1767) at the pilgrimage church in Hafnerberg in Lower Austria.

Wolfgang Kogert is a regular juror at organ and composition competitions and writes articles for journals. Furthermore, he acts as a consultant to organ-building projects and to the organ cycle of Jeunesse – Austrian Youth Music.

Teaching

After six years teaching at the Academy of Music in Detmold, since 2015 Wolfgang Kogert has taught organ at the Mozarteum University in Salzburg. He passed his artistic habilitation in 2019.

In the summer semester of 2020, he was deputizing for David Franke in the latter’s capacity as Professor of Organ and Improvisation at the Academy of Music in Freiburg.

He has been invited to hold courses, talks and recitals by e.g. the University of Music and the Performing Arts in Vienna, the Art University in Graz, the Conservatorium van Amsterdam, the Norwegian Academy of Music in Oslo and the Prague Conservatory.

Publications

„Es gab Gegenwind, aber der hat mich nicht interessiert.“ Zsigmond Szathmáry im Gespräch, in: Kurt Estermann (Hg.): Die Orgeln der Hofkirche Innsbruck und ihr kulturelles Umfeld: Geschichte und Gegenwart, Tagungsbericht 2019 zum Maximilian- Jubiläum (= Studia Wilthinensia Artis Organi, Bd. 4). Verlag Helbling, Innsbruck 2022.

„Die Frische des Einfalls muss erhalten bleiben.“ Friedrich Cerhas Orgelwerke, in: Kurt Estermann (Hg.): Die Orgeln der Hofkirche Innsbruck und ihr kulturelles Umfeld: Geschichte und Gegenwart, Tagungsbericht 2019 zum Maximilian-Jubiläum (= Studia Wilthinensia Artis Organi, Bd. 4). Verlag Helbling, Innsbruck 2022.

Josef Matthias Hauer: Zwei Zwölftonspiele für Orgel (1947), Erstdruck. Musikverlag Doblinger, Wien 2021.

Jean-Pierre Leguay 80, in: Singende Kirche, Heft 3/2019, Salzburg 2019.

Zsigmond Szathmáry 80, in: Singende Kirche, Heft 3/2019, Salzburg 2019.

Neues Repertoire für Orgel seit dem Jahr 2000, in: Das Orgelforum, Nr. 21, Wien 2018.

Zur Interpretation von Friedrich Cerhas Neun Inventionen und Neun Präludien für Orgel, in: Das Orgelforum, Nr. 18, Wien 2015.

(last update: August 2023)

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