Frank Peter Zimmerman

Frank Peter Zimmermann is widely regarded as one of the foremost violinists of his generation. Praised for his selfless musicality, brilliance, and keen intelligence, he has been performing with major orchestras around the world for more than three decades, collaborating with renowned conductors. His concert engagements regularly take him to prominent venues and international music festivals in Europe, the United States, Asia, South America, and Australia.

Highlights of the 2023-24 season included a tour with the Vienna Philharmonic and Daniel Harding; concerts with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Staatskapelle Dresden, and Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, all conducted by Harding; performances with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Edward Gardner; the Bayerisches Staatsorchester and Vladimir Jurowski; the Bamberger Symphoniker and Andrew Manze; the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester and Kazuki Yamada; and the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester and Alan Gilbert. He will also perform with the Montreal and Toronto symphony orchestras, conducted by Rafael Payare and Gustavo Gimeno, respectively. He also gave recitals in Europe with pianists Martin Helmchen and Dmytro Choni.

Over the years, Zimmermann has built an impressive discography for EMI Classics, Sony Classical, BIS Records, Hänssler Classic, Ondine, Decca, Teldec Classics, and ECM Records. He has recorded nearly all major violin concerto repertoire, from Bach to Ligeti, as well as recital repertoire. Many of these recordings have received prestigious awards worldwide. His most recent releases include the two violin concertos by Martinů with the Bamberger Symphoniker and Jakub Hrůša, coupled with Bartók’s Sonata for Solo Violin for BIS; the complete sonatas for piano and violin by Beethoven with Martin Helmchen for BIS; a sonata and two partitas by J.S. Bach for BIS; the two Shostakovich violin concertos with the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester and Alan Gilbert for BIS, which was nominated for a Grammy Award; and the J.S. Bach violin concertos with the Berliner Barock Solisten for Hänssler Classic. In September 2021, the Berliner Philharmoniker released a special CD featuring Zimmermann’s performances of the Bartók, Beethoven, and Berg concertos under conductors Gilbert, Harding, and Kirill Petrenko, respectively. In 2022, this recording received both the Gramophone Award and the German Record Critics' Award.

Zimmermann has received numerous prizes and honors, including the 1990 Premio dell'Accademia Musicale Chigiana, Siena; the 1994 Rheinischer Kulturpreis; the 2002 Musikpreis of the city of Duisburg; Germany's 2008 Federal Cross of Merit—1st Class; and Hanau's 2010 Paul Hindemith Prize.

In 2010, Zimmermann founded the Trio Zimmermann with violist Antoine Tamestit and cellist Christian Poltéra. The trio has performed in major music centers and festivals across Europe for over a decade. With BIS Records, they've released award-winning recordings of string trio works by J.S. Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Schubert, Schoenberg, and Hindemith.

Zimmermann has premiered violin concertos by Magnus Lindberg, Matthias Pintscher (en sourdine), Brett Dean (The Lost Art of Letter Writing), and Augusta Read Thomas (Juggler in Paradise).

Born in 1965 in Duisburg, Germany, Zimmermann started playing the violin at age 5 and gave his first concert with an orchestra at age 10. He studied with Valery Gradov, Saschko Gawriloff, and Herman Krebbers.

Zimmermann plays the 1711 Antonio Stradivari violin “Lady Inchiquin,” kindly provided by the Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Düsseldorf.