The Freiburg Baroque Orchestra (FBO) is one of the leading ensembles of historically informed performance practice. It has helped shape the international music scene for more than 30 years, setting musical standards through its concerts and recordings.
The FBO was founded in 1987 by former students of the Music Academy in Freiburg, including a number from Rainer Kussmaul’s violin class. The ensemble soon became one of the most sought-after orchestras performing with historical instruments and gained an international reputation. The FBO is a regular guest at the world’s most important concert halls, including the Philharmonie in Berlin, London’s Wigmore Hall, Lincoln Center in New York, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam and the Philharmonie in Paris. The ensemble’s concert tours span various continents. The FBO also has its own subscription series in Freiburg, Stuttgart and Berlin and is a guest at major music festivals, including the Salzburg Festival, the Tanglewood Festival and the Innsbruck Festival of Early Music.
Following historically informed performance practice, the FBO usually gives concerts without a conductor, though for selected projects, including operatic performances or larger orchestral works, it works with such well-known conductors as Pablo Heras-Casado, Simon Rattle and Teodor Currentzis. The FBO has enjoyed a particularly intense collaboration with René Jacobs, including performances of Mozart’s operas, as well as Baroque and Classical oratorios.
The FBO’s artistic directors are Gottfried von der Goltz (violin) and Kristian Bezuidenhout (fortepiano), who took over the position from Petra Müllejans in 2017. Both artists appear as soloists with the FBO, though the ensemble also works with other renowned instrumentalists and singers, including Isabelle Faust, Philippe Jaroussky, Christian Gerhaher, Alexander Melnikov, Andreas Staier and Jean-Guihen Queyras.
The FBO’s extraordinary musical diversity has been documented on numerous recordings, many of which have won several prizes and awards.
During the 2020/21 season, the FBO appeared at the Innsbruck Festival of Early Music, the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg and the Theater an der Wien, as well as touring the Canary Islands. An extended East Asian tour with Kristian Bezuidenhout is planned for next season.
