Guy Braunstein: The Israeli Who Led the Berlin Philharmonic
There are perhaps a dozen orchestral chairs in the world that a string player dreams of, and the concertmaster's seat of the Berlin Philharmonic sits at the very top of that list. In 2000, it went to a twenty-nine-year-old from Tel Aviv named Guy Braunstein — one of the youngest musicians ever to lead the orchestra, and the latest proof that the small Israeli musical world kept producing players good enough to sit at the head of the greatest ensembles on earth.
Tel Aviv to New York
Guy Braunstein was born in 1971 in Tel Aviv. He began the violin young and studied first in Israel — including with Chaim Taub, a central figure in Israeli chamber music — before moving to New York to continue his training. There he worked with Glenn Dicterow, the concertmaster of the New York Philharmonic, and with the great Israeli violinist Pinchas Zukerman, absorbing both the orchestral discipline and the soloist's freedom that would define his career.
He established himself quickly as a soloist and chamber musician, the kind of player whose name began to circulate among musicians before it was widely known to the public. He had the technical command of the great Israeli school and, just as importantly, the musical intelligence to lead rather than merely to play.
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In 2000, the Berlin Philharmonic — then under Claudio Abbado and soon Simon Rattle — appointed Braunstein its first concertmaster. The role is far more than playing the most exposed solos in the orchestral repertoire; the concertmaster is the bridge between the conductor and the players, responsible for the unity of the entire string section and, in many ways, for the sound of the orchestra itself. To hold it at twenty-nine, in Berlin, was an extraordinary statement of confidence.
Braunstein led the orchestra for thirteen years, until 2013, performing the great solos, directing from the first chair, and appearing as concerto soloist with the ensemble. When he stepped down, it was to expand the parts of his musical life that a concertmaster's schedule could not contain.
Soloist and Conductor
Since leaving Berlin, Braunstein has built a wide-ranging career as a violin soloist, chamber musician, and increasingly as a conductor, leading orchestras across Europe and beyond. He has also composed and arranged, and his transcriptions for violin have entered the repertoire of other players. The trajectory — from prodigy, to the world's most prestigious orchestral chair, to the podium — is one only a complete musician can travel.
Why This Matters
Braunstein's career is a reminder that the Israeli musical phenomenon was never only about solo superstars. The same training that produced Perlman and Zukerman also produced the players capable of leading the world's orchestras from within — the concertmasters, the section leaders, the chamber musicians who hold the ensemble together.
That he held the Berlin chair, and held it young, says something about both the man and the system that formed him. A child from Tel Aviv grew up to be the first violin of the orchestra many consider the finest in the world, and then walked away from it to keep growing. It is the portrait of a musician who treated even the highest summit as a stage on a longer climb.
Achievements
- Concertmaster of the Berlin Philharmonic from 2000 to 2013
- One of the youngest musicians ever appointed to the role
- International career as a violin soloist and chamber musician
- Active as a conductor across Europe
- Composer and arranger for the violin
