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Martin Fröst

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

Martin Fröst is a Swedish clarinettist and conductor, born in 1970 in Uppsala. He began on the violin at five and on the clarinet at nine, after hearing a recording of Jack Brymer playing Mozart's clarinet concerto. He studied in Stockholm with Sölve Kingstedt and Kjell-Inge Stevensson and in Hanover with Hans Deinzer. At seventeen he played his first concert with the orchestra of the Royal Swedish Academy of Music.

Music and breakthrough

As a soloist he has played with the great orchestras of the world, such as the New York Philharmonic, the Concertgebouw Orchestra, the London Symphony Orchestra and the Wiener Symphoniker. He is the first clarinettist to receive the Léonie Sonning Music Prize, an award also received by Stravinsky, Bernstein and Miles Davis. In the 2022-23 season he was the only wind player to be artist in residence at the Concertgebouw Orchestra. In 2019 he became chief conductor of the Swedish Chamber Orchestra. Composers such as John Adams, Krzysztof Penderecki, Anna Clyne and Anders Hillborg have written works especially for him. His first albums include The Pied Piper of the Opera from 1993 and French Beauties and Swedish Beasts from 1994. Fröst also makes multimedia projects with music, choreography and lighting design, in which he plays the clarinet, conducts and presents.

Influence

He shows how a classical soloist can break through the boundaries between music, dance and theatre.

Listening

Listening tip. Listen to Fröst in Mozart's clarinet concerto and notice the soft, singing tone in the slow movement. Can you hear how the clarinet sounds almost like a human voice?

Discography

Studio albums

Categories: Artists