double bass

Goran Kostić, born in Belgrade/Serbia, completed his studies with Prof. Klaus Trumpf in Munich. In addition to his diverse orchestral activities, his affinity for chamber music and solo playing led to a professorship for chamber music at the University in Kragujevac/Serbia in 2009 as well as numerous master classes and concerts throughout Europe. As a result of his artistic activity and many years of research in the field of solo playing, he received his PhD from the University in Belgrade in 2017.
Goran Kostić focuses on considering the double bass as an equal solo instrument of the string instrument family. This gave birth to the idea of "Double Bass & Rhodes", for which several pieces have already been provided by composers. It is 'classical' music of the 21st century, but strongly influenced by American popular forms of the 20th century - jazz and rock.

Michael Pistelok was born in Bytom, Poland in 1962.

His musical talent was already evident at the age of six while he was still at kindergarten, and he began to learn the violin at the local state music school. Six years later he switched to double bass. He graduated with distinction in double bass from the Music Academy in Katowice, Poland.
While still studying there, he was engaged by some of Poland’s leading orchestras such as the Sinfonia Varsovia. He was also a member of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra and played as double bass leader under such renowned conductors as Claudio Abbado, Lorin Maazel, George Prêtre, Marc Minkowski, Gustavo Dudamel and Daniel Harding.

He is also a much sought-after interpreter of contemporary music in ensembles such as Kontrapunkte and “die reihe”.

Michael Pistelok has been a member of the ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra since 1987 and since 2001 has been assistant principal double bass.

Bernhard Ziegler was born in 1964.

He studied at the Leopold Mozart Centre for Music and Music Education at the University of Augsburg and at the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna in Ludwig Streicher’s double bass class.

He is a lecturer in double bass at the Joseph Haydn Landeskonservatorium where he has established a particular teaching focus by founding a double bass class for children. He is also a founder of the double bass teachers’ collective Pädagogische Arbeitsgemeinschaft Kontrabass PAKOE. In addition, he holds lectures on the history of, teaching of and other topics relating to the instrument at double bass seminars and publishes literature on the instrument via Vienna Bass Edition.

Bernhard Ziegler was also a judge for the prima la musica competition and had the same function at the first international competition for young bass players at Bass 2010 in Berlin and Bass 2012 in Copenhagen.

Bernhard Ziegler has been a member of the ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra since 2001.

Yamato Moritake was born in Fukuoka, Japan. After studies at the University of Music and Performing Arts Tokyo and the University of Music and Theatre Munich, he completed a master's degree with distinction at the Anton Bruckner Private University Linz. His teachers were Osamu Yamamoto, Yoshio Nagashima, Naoto Nishida, Heinrich Braun and Anton Schachenhofer.

He was a scholarship holder of the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, the Yamaha Foundation and the Yu-International Foundation. He received the first prize and the Fuka Special Prize at the International Simandl Competition in 2014, and in 2018 he became a principal in the Brucknerorchester Linz. During his tenure with the Brucknerorchester Linz from 2012 to 2018, he regularly organized concerts with Caritas for people in need.

As a member of the Vienna State Opera, Dresden State Orchestra, Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Munich Chamber Orchestra, Lower Austrian Tonkünstler Orchestra, Tokyo Philharmonic, New Japan Philharmonic, Yomiuri Symphony Orchestra, Tokyo City Symphony Orchestra, Sapporo Symphony Orchestra and Japan Chamber Orchestra, he has regularly performed in Austria, Germany, France, Great Britain, USA, Russia, Japan, South Korea, China, Bulgaria, Romania, Switzerland and Turkey.

In addition to his occupation as a double bass player, he performed as an electric bass soloist in the Golden Hall of the Musikverein Vienna under Dennis Russell Davies with the Bruckner Orchestra Linz.

Since November 2018 he is a member of the ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra and teacher in the Landesmusikschule Grein.