If you google the term "academy" you will be presented with two kind of hits: one of which provides a fitting description for the Stuttgart wind-instrument academy as "a place for the promotion of scientific and artistic studies", and the other describes an academy as "an unfinished university". Now, if you consider that our university counts as one of the most modern in Germany and that the Stuttgart wind-instrument academy is just one of the many excellent resources available to our students then it is easy to see that our academy takes the former definition.  

The academy forms a staff/student interface that continually makes adjustments to the pedagogical needs of the students and how far these have to shift so that the material taught in the lectures and seminars can be realistically applied. So the teachers themselves are put into concert situations and profit from student input. The key role of an academy should not be taken for granted, neither in Germany nor in other countries. It has often been my experience when abroad that performing music in lessons was viewed as being something special and that playing chamber music almost as something revolutionary.  

We are very fortunate to have a teaching team who are very dedicated to these concepts and most of all who enjoy their work. They continue the wind-instrument academy tradition that Ingo Goritzki started in the 80s. The respective literature also plays a key role in the preparation of our students, a key theme here are the great works of Mozart. Of course, our efforts to accommodate all of the brass instrument classes and percussion often lead to new innovation and novel directions. In conjunction with the directors of the university, we were able to issue multiple requests to the renowned arranger Andreas Tarkmann. Indeed, one of our first artistic highlights was the performance of Strauss’ “Till Eulenspiegel“ (without conductor) and early in 2011 a program with "Russian magic“.

In our experience, we have discovered that creating music together is not just an artistic activity, but it also has a social dimension. This is due to our uniform approach to teaching music, in which we strongly believe in the significance of practice, because integrating into an ensemble requires careful guidance and, if done properly, enables students to fit into professional orchestras much more easily. The Stuttgart wind-instrument academy is loved by professors and students alike, and remains a guiding light and integral part of our training.