Mario Hossen is an Austro-Bulgarian soloist of international acclaim. He has performed with renowned orchestras such as the London Philharmonic Orchestra, the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, the Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra of Moscow Radio, the English Chamber Orchestra, the Orchester Wiener Akadmie, the RTV Slovenia Symphony Orchestra, the Bruckner Orchestra Linz, I Solisti Veneti, the Helsinki Baroque Orchestra, the Sofia Philharmonic, the Orquesta Sinfónica del Estado de México, the Presidential Symphony Orchestra Ankara, the Vienna Chamber Orchestra, the Franz Liszt Chamber Orchestra, the Dohnányi Orchestra Budapest, the Wiener Concert-Verein, the Cappella Istropolitana, the Orchestra Filarmonica Italiana, the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra, and the Bulgarian National Radio Symphony Orchestra.
Hailed for his incredible virtuosity and charismatic stage presence, he plays a repertoire all the way from Renaissance to Classical music and to contemporary works and Jazz. Together with music by leading last centuries composers, he performs and promotes the works of the great Bulgarian composers Pancho Vladigerov, Marin Goleminov and Peter Christoskov.
Hossen was born in Plovdiv, Bulgaria. His mother, Nelly Batchvarova, was an opera singer and his father was a lawyer. His ancestry is a blend of four nationalities. He has been living in Vienna since 1991, and in 1995 received Austrian citizenship in the special interest of the Republic.
Mario Hossen holds several prestigious Awards, among them the City of Sofia, Musician of the Year, Classic FM award. The oldest Bulgarian Music Festival, the “Varna Summer International Music festival”(1926), under Prof. Mario Hossen as Artistic Director, was the European Festival Association (EFA), EFFE laureate for the 2019-2020-season and the winner of the European Audience Award.
Mario received his education in Sofia, Vienna and Paris. At the early age of 3 years, he asked for a violin, at 5 he started to play piano, at 6 he began his violin studies in Plovdiv with his first teacher Atanas Batchvarov. Among his teachers are Darina Dankova, Michael Frischenschlager and Gerard Poulet. He had his debut as a soloist with orchestra at the age of eight. Since then, he has given concerts with the major Bulgarian Orchestras and in prestigious international halls of more than 35 countries.
He dives deep into every piece, considering the musical historical context and the greatest possible authenticity. Hossen‘s musicological and artistic endeavors are focused among other things on source research on Niccolò Paganini. He is considered as one of the leading interpreters and experts of Paganini’s Music. The complete oeuvre of Paganini for solo violin and for violin with orchestra are available as a historical-critical (urtext) editions sheet music, by Doblinger’s “Diletto Musicale” Music Series-Vienna.
Mario Hosen has released 22 CD albums for the Italian record label Dynamic (Genova) and for Doron Music Switzerland. His discography includes integrals with the N. Paganini quartets, the violin sonatas of L. v. Beethoven, J. S. Bach and G. F. Handel, the violin concertos of N. Paganini, M. Bruch, F. Mendelssohn, J. Brahms, as well as world premiere recordings of unreleased works by N. Paganini, W. A. Mozart, G. Tartini, A. Rolla and S. Mercadante. Among the composers who dedicated works to him are Rainer Bischof, Tomás Marco, François-Pierre Descamps, Walter Baer, Alessandro Solbiati, Milko Kolarov and Georgi Arnaoudov.
In 2019, Maestro Mario Hossen accepted the proposal for the recording of the complete Quartets and chamber music works by Niccolo Paganini and founded the “PAGANINI ENSEMBLE VIENNA”. He is founder and artistic director of the international summer academy and music festival "Orpheus", held annually in Vienna.
As a conducting soloist, he leads the Vienna Chamber Orchestra in the concert series “Concert Spirituel” in Vienna.
Mario Hossen plays a G.B. Guadagnini Violin (1749), which is loaned to him by the Austrian National Bank. He plays all concerts exclusively on his preferred “Thomastik-Infeld” strings.
