Stefan Rapp

Born in Böblingen in 1968, Stefan Rapp studied percussion with Bernhard Wulff at the Freiburg Musikhochschule. After an engagement at the Royal Opera in Copenhagen he became timpanist of the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen in 1996, a position he held for 23 years. As a founding member of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra and through his collaboration with Ensemble Modern he gathered experience between symphonic tradition and contemporary ensemble practice. With ANTARES – The German Percussion Collective, the Bremen chamber music series Back to the Roots and the Mosaik festival he created fields of activity of his own for new music and improvisation. From 1998 to 2005 he led the percussion class at the Bremen Musikhochschule; in 2018 he was appointed to the newly created professorship of classical percussion at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Leipzig. In concert and teaching he engages in particular with the timpani and with the solo and chamber repertoire of percussion, drawing also on the complex playing techniques of other musical cultures.