Anne-Sophie Mutter

Anne-Sophie Mutter (born June 29, 1963 in Rheinfelden, Germany) is a German violinist.
Mutter started playing the piano at age five. Shortly after, she began playing the violin, studying with Erna Honigberger and Aida Stucki.
After winning several prizes, she was exempted from school to dedicate herself to her art. When she was 13, conductor Herbert von Karajan invited her to play with the Berlin Philharmonic. In 1977, she made her debut at the Salzburg Festival and with the English Chamber Orchestra under Daniel Barenboim.
At 15, Mutter made her first recording of the Mozart Third and Fifth Violin Concertos with von Karajan and the Berlin Philharmonic. The same year, she was named Artist of the Year.
In 1980, she made her American debut with the New York Philharmonic under Zubin Mehta. In 1985, at the age of 22, she was made an honorary fellow of the Royal Academy of Music (London) and head of its faculty of international violin studies. In 1988, she made a grand tour of Canada and the United States, playing for the first time at Carnegie Hall. In 1998 she played and recorded for CD and DVD the complete set of Beethoven's Violin Sonatas, accompanied by Lambert Orkis; these were broadcast on television in many countries.
Though her repertoire includes many classical works, Mutter is particularly known for her performances of modern music. A number of pieces have been especially written for or dedicated to her, including Henri Dutilleux's Sur le Même Accord, Witold Lutosławski's Partita, Krzysztof Penderecki's Second Violin Concerto and Wolfgang Rihm's Gesungene Zeit ("Time Chant"). She has received various prizes, including several Grammys. She also owns two Stradivarius violins (The Emiliani of 1703, and the Lord Dunn-Raven of 1710).
In October 2006, on French television, Mutter appeared to indicate that she would be retiring when she turned 45, in 2008. However the following month she said that her words were "misinterpreted" and that she would continue to play as long as she felt she could "bring anything new, anything important, anything different to music”.
In 1989, Mutter married her first husband, Detlef Wunderlich, with whom she had two children, Arabella and Richard. Detlef died in 1995. She married the pianist and conductor André Previn in 2002, living in Munich with him and her children.
On 21 August 2006, Mutter's office announced that she and André Previn had divorced. The couple were rumoured to have separated three months previously, but confirmed their divorce as of the above date.


Awards and recognitions :
Grammy Award for Best Chamber Music Performance:
• Anne-Sophie Mutter & Lambert Orkis for Beethoven: The Violin Sonatas (Nos. 1-3, Op. 12; Nos. 1-3, Op. 30; "Spring" Sonata) (2000)
Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Soloist(s) Performance (with orchestra):
• Anne-Sophie Mutter & André Previn (conductor) for Previn: Violin Concerto "Anne-Sophie"/Bernstein: Serenade (2005)
• Anne-Sophie Mutter, Krzysztof Penderecki (conductor) & the London Symphony Orchestra for Penderecki: Violin Concerto No. 2, Metamorphosen (1999)
• Anne-Sophie Mutter, James Levine (conductor) & the Chicago Symphony Orchestra for Berg: Violin Concerto/Rihm: Time Chant (1994)


Partial discography
On Deutsche Grammophon:
• Mozart Violin Concertos Nos. 3 & 5 (1978)
• Beethoven Triple Concerto (1980)
• Brahms Violin Concerto (1982)
• Brahms Double Concerto (1983)
• Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto (1988)
• Lutosławski Partita & Chain 2/Stravinsky Violin Concerto (1988)
• Beethoven: The String Trios (1989)
• Bartok Violin Concerto No. 2/Moret En Rêve (1991)
• Berg Violin Concerto/Rihm Time Chant (1992)
• Carmen-Fantasie (1993)
• Romance (1995)
• Sibelius Violin Concerto (1995)
• The Berlin Recital (1996)
• Brahms Violin Concerto/Schumann Fantasy for Violin and Orchestra (1997)
• Penderecki Violin Concerto No. 2/Bartok Sonata for Violin and Piano No. 2 (1997)
• Beethoven The Violin Sonatas (1998)
• Vivaldi The Four Seasons (1999)
• Recital 2000 (2000)
• Lutosławski Partita for Violin and Orchestra/Chain 2 (2002)
• Beethoven Violin Concerto (2002)
• Tango Song and Dance (2003)
• Previn Violin Concerto/Bernstein Serenade (2003)
• Tchaikovsky & Korngold Violin Concertos (2004)
• Dutilleux Sur le même accord/Bartok Violin Concerto No. 2/Stravinsky Concerto en ré (2005)
• Mozart The Violin Concertos (2005)
• Mozart Piano Trios K502, K542, K548 (2006)
• Mozart The Violin Sonatas (August, 2006)
On EMI Classics:
• Mozart Violin Concertos Nos. 2 & 4 (1982)
• Bach Violin Concertos/Concerto for Two Violins and Orchestra (1983)
• Brahms Violin Sonatas (1983)
• Vivaldi The Four Seasons (1984)
• Lalo: Symphonie Espagnole/Sarasate: Zigeunerweisen (1985)
• Mozart Violin Concerto No. 1, Sinfonia Concertante (1991)
On Erato:
• Glazunov Violin Concerto/Prokofiev Violin Concerto No. 1 (1989)