After completing his studies at Music High School in Stuttgart and Detmold under Tibor Varga, Prof. Wilfried Strehle started his career in 1971 at the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, whose solo violist he was from 1984 to 2013. In addition to his orchestral work, he has a strong passion for chamber music: he was co-founder of the Brandis Quartet 1976 and played in the Cyprien Katsaris Piano Quintet, Philharmonic Sextet, Philharmonic Octet Berlin, the Philharmonic Virtuosi and the Philharmonic Camerata. He is currently a member of the Philharmonic Friends Vienna-Berlin. The Trio-Berlin, founded by him, was awarded the European Chamber Music Prize. Prof. Wilfried Strehle taught at the Orchestra Academy of the Berlin Philharmonic and is a visiting professor at the Berlin University of the Arts. He regularly gives masterclasses at the Summer Academy Mozarteum in Salzburg, Eastern Europe, Italy, Spain, at the universities of Tokyo, Seoul, Moscow and Yale (USA) and for the Blackmore International Music Academy in Berlin and Vienna. Prof. Strehle is the initiator and artistic director of the Blackmore International Music Academy.

Dylan Blackmore studied violin at the University of Music Würzburg with Prof. Grigori Zhislin and Prof. Conrad von der Goltz. He also attended masterclasses with Yehudi Menuhin, Zakhar Bron and Viktor Tretiakov. Since 1999 he continued his studies at the Musikhochschule Cologne with Prof. Viktor Tretiakov, where he received his diploma in 2003 and graduated in 2007 with the concert exam. Dylan Blackmore made his solo debut with orchestra at the Berlin Philharmonic in 2006, at the Oslo Concertus and the Royal Coronation Hall in Stockholm. He was a guest at the Summer Academy of the Junge Münchner Philharmonie as a lecturer and concertmaster, as well as at the International Masterclasses in Bad Kissingen, organized by him. In addition to his numerous engagements as a soloist and chamber musician, Dylan Blackmore occasionally occupied leading positions in internationally renowned orchestras such as the Essen Philharmonic, the Orchester Philharmonique de Strasbourg, the Limburg Symphony Orchestra Maastricht and the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin. Since the beginning of his studies, Blackmore has performed throughout Europe with orchestras such as the “Düsseldorfer Kammerorchester”, the “Junge Philharmonie Köln”, the “Israel Soloist Ensemble”, the “Brandenburg Philharmonic Frankfurt Oder”, the Hofer Symphoniker, the Kammerphilharmonie Leipzig, the Pleven Philharmonic Orchestra, the Classical Philharmonic Bonn and the Orchester Philharmonique de Strasbourg. Dylan Blackmore was a scholarship holder of the “Pro Musica Viva Maria Strecker-Daelen Foundation” (Mainz) and the “Friedrich Ebert Foundation” (Bonn). In 2005, he won the second prize at the International Violin Competition “Julio Cardona” in Portugal and became a valued soloist and chamber musician in demand. In 2015, Blackmore founded an International Music Academy, where regular studies and international masterclasses are held.