“Gallardo and Sung (Berger) do not simply play together, they experience the music together, it comes alive in their hands …”
Mainz Rhein-Zeitung

Hyun-Jung Berger

Born in Seoul, South Korea, Hyun-Jung Berger studied with Prof. Hae-Guen Kang in Seoul and with Prof. Julius Berger and Prof. Thomas Demenga in Basel. She attended the master classes of Boris Pergamenschikov, Heinrich Schiff and Denes Zsigmondy.

She has been teaching since 1991, first as an assistant of Prof. Julius Berger at the Saarbrücken College of Music, later at Mainz University. In 2008 she began lecturing at the Leopold Mozart Centre of Augsburg University.

Numerous national and international awards underline Hyun-Jung Berger’s rank as an artist of exceptional musical talent. In 1993 she won the Gieseking Prize of the Saarbrücken College of Music as well as a prize at the International Summer Academy of the Salzburg Mozarteum; in 1995 she won the prize of the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, first prize at the International Competition in Trapani, Sicily, and, together with her duo partner José Gallardo, the International Press Award.

The renowned orchestras with which Hyun-Jung Berger has performed as a soloist include the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra, the Korean Symphony Orchestra, the Korean Chamber Orchestra, the Lucerne Festival Strings, the Basel Symphony Orchestra, the Bern Philharmonic Academy, the Kremerata Baltica and the Southwest German Chamber Orchestra. Hyun-Jung Berger has given duo and chamber recitals in Israel and the USA, at the Lockenhaus Chamber Music Festival, at the Asiago Festival, at the Rheingau Music Festival, at the Eckelshausen Music Festival and at the Kronberg Cello Festival.

Together with her husband Julius Berger, Hyun-Jung Berger has recorded several CDs (notably of Boccherini sonatas) that have been given reference status by international periodicals.

As the artistic director of the Asiago Festival Korea, Hyun-Jung Berger establishes connections between Europe and her native country.

José Gallardo

Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, José Gallardo had his first piano tuition at the age of five, initially at the Buenos Aires Conservatory. He later studied with Prof. Poldi Mildner at Mainz University and received his diploma in 1997. He discovered his partiality for chamber music during that period.

He has received musical stimulation from artists like Menahem Pressler, Alfonso Montecino, Karl-Heinz Kämmerling, Sergiu Celibidache, Rosalyn Tureck and Bernard Greenhouse.

José Gallardo has won numerous national and international prizes, some together with his duo partner Hyun-Jung Berger. Numerous tours followed, as well as appearances at the Lockenhaus Chamber Music Festival, the Asiago Festival in Italy, the Ludwigsburg Schlossfestspiele, the Schwetzingen Festival, the Kronberg Cello Festival, the Rheingau Music Festival and the Lucerne Festival.

His full concert and chamber-music schedule in Europe, Asia, Israel, Oceania and South America associates him with artists like Alberto Lysy, Gidon Kremer, Chen Zimbalista, Julius Berger, Danjulo Ishizaka, Nicolas Altstaedt and Joshua Bell. The major concert halls he has performed at include the Berlin Philharmonie, the Zurich Tonhalle, the Musikhalle (Laeiszhalle) in Hamburg, the Wiesbaden Spa Hotel, the Teatro della Pergola in Florence and the Wigmore Hall in London.

He lectured at Mainz University from 1998 to 2008, since the autumn of which year he has been teaching at the Leopold Mozart Centre of Augsburg University.