Concert: Bensmann Saxophone Quartet

Sunday, August 25, 2024; 5 p.m. in the Friedenskirche

We cordially invite you to a concert by the

“Bensmann Saxophone Quartet”

Detlef Bensmann, Lilly Paddags, Boliang Liu and Ninoslav Dimov

play original compositions and arrangements of classical works specially arranged for this unusual instrumentation, including Johann Sebastian Bach (“Art of Fugue”), Alexander Glasunov’s Saxophone Concerto op. 109, as well as various dances from France (C. Debussy and J. B. Lully), Germany, Cuba, China, Macedonia and Argentina (A. Piazzolla).

Admission is free. The concert is supported by ArDeSa.

The Bensmann Saxophone Quartet made its debut at the Berliner Ensemble in 2006 with the world premiere of Brecht’s “Lehrstück”.

They later performed at the Kurt Weill Festival, the summer festival in Weilburg, various concert series in Germany, China, Macedonia, Croatia and Poland. Concert series in Germany, China, Macedonia, Croatia and Poland. The ensemble sees itself in the tradition of the first German Saxophone Quartet of 1930 around the pioneer Gustav Bumcke and the Berlin Saxophone Quartet, which Detlef Bensmann co-founded in 1984 as primarius (soprano saxophonist) and left in 2010 to devote himself more intensively to his newly founded saxophone quartet. Their repertoire focuses on the “Art of Fugue” by Johann Sebastian Bach in original performance practice, which they interpret as the life cycle of a person set to music, and original literature since 1855. A founding member of the Bensmann-SQ is Ninoslav Dimov (alto saxophone), who studied with Detlef Bensmann at the Berlin University of the Arts and is now a professor of saxophone and head of the wind department at the Skopje Academy of Music, as well as performing internationally as a soloist and chamber musician. The tenor saxophone is played by Lilly Paddags, who has been working with Detlef Bensmann and Ninoslav Dimov since 2017. She has won prizes in various competitions, plays in various chamber music ensembles, has been a soloist in several saxophone concerto performances and plays the saxophone parts in orchestras. The baritone saxophonist Boliang Liu is also a multiple prizewinner of international competitions and plays in various chamber music ensembles and orchestras. chamber music ensembles, as well as in a duo with Lilly Paddags, with whom he won first prize in the chamber music competition in Ohrid (North Macedonia) in 2021. With Detlef Bensmann and the Berlin State Accordion Orchestra, he played the world premiere of Wolfgang Jacobi’s Double Concerto and the world premiere of the finale of Erwin Schulhoff’s Hot Sonata in an arrangement by Detlef Bensmann in October 2023.