Leonard Melcher

Leonard Melcher was born in Bad Soden am Taunus in 1997 and began taking violin and piano lessons at an early age. He gained his first orchestral experience in the Landesjugendsinfonieorchester Hessen, as well as serving as concertmaster and section leader in several youth orchestras and in the tutti section of the Junge Deutsche Philharmonie.

He began his violin studies in 2016 in Stuttgart with Prof. Kolja Lessing, continued them in Frankfurt with Prof. Sophia Jaffé and Prof. Susanne Stoodt and completed his bachelor’s degree in 2021. This was followed by a master’s program in Lübeck with Prof. Elisabeth Weber and Carlos Johnson (2022–2024), which he completed with top marks. In 2022–23, he was an academician with the Lübeck Philharmonic Orchestra and completed an Erasmus semester in Oslo with Prof. Henning Kraggerud. He gained further inspiration from masterclasses with the professors Mark Gothoni, Ulf Hoelscher, Stefan Hempel, Rudens Turku, Heime Müller, Maria Elisabeth Lott and Erika Geldsetzer. As a soloist with the Pan Symphony Orchestra, he performed Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 5 in 2021 and as a chamber musician, he performed during his master’s studies with musicians such as Pauline Sachse, Troels Svane, Elisabeth Weber, Jens Thoben and Peter Bruns.

Since 2023, contemporary music has been a major focus of his work. Following projects with the Ensemble Modern at the Musikfest Berlin, he became a member of the International Ensemble Modern Academy 2024/25 and has performed at the Lucerne Festival, the Gaudeamus Festival and the Wittener Tage für neue Kammermusik, among others. He is a founding member of the Chroma Kollektiv, formed within the IEMA 2024/25. In 2025, he again performed with Ensemble Modern, including at Musikfest Berlin in celebration of the 90th birthday of Helmut Lachenmann. Since September 2025, he has also been working as a freelance musician with the Frankfurter Opern- und Museumsorchester.