Japan Debut – Viola Recital in Niigata

On 9 November 2025 Marc Sabbah gave his Japan recital debut in Niigata, with pianist Koki Kuroiwa, including the world premiere of a new work by Kensaku Shimizu. Below is an English translation of the concert flyer.

Front of the flyer

Praised by the great maestro Zubin Mehta – a violist who represents the classical world, in Japan for the first time!

Daishi Hokuetsu Life-Up Concert Marc Sabbah – Viola Recital "The wonderful joys of the viola"

• Date: Sunday 9 November 2025, 14:00 (doors open 13:30)
• Venue: Daishi Hokuetsu Hall (inside the head office of Daishi Hokuetsu Bank), Niigata
• Tickets (unreserved seating): general ¥2,000 in advance / ¥2,500 at the door; students ¥500 / ¥1,000; pair ticket ¥3,000 (¥1,500 each, advance sale only). If advance tickets sell out, there is no sale at the door. Pre-school children cannot be admitted.
• Piano: Koki Kuroiwa
• Organiser: Daishi Hokuetsu Bank

Programme

• J.S. Bach: Cello Suite No. 3 in C major, BWV 1009 (viola version)
• Brahms: Viola Sonata No. 1 in F minor, Op. 120 No. 1
• Kensaku Shimizu: Sumidagawa-shō for viola and piano (world premiere)
• Schubert: Arpeggione Sonata in A minor, D 821

Back of the flyer – profile of Marc Sabbah

Born in New York in 1988. He began the violin at the age of three and, drawn to the warm tone of the viola and to his sister's cello playing, switched to the viola at eleven. He graduated from the Pre-College Division of the Juilliard School and graduated with distinction from the Conservatorium van Amsterdam. From 2012 to 2024 he was principal solo violist of the Belgian National Orchestra.

He won 1st prize at the Amsterdam National Viola Competition in 2013, and in 2016 the 1st prize of the Rising Stars Grand Prix and the 1st prize of the Manhattan International Music Competition, giving a recital at Carnegie Hall. Besides his work as a soloist and chamber musician, he is invited as guest principal violist by orchestras such as the Israel Philharmonic, the Orchestre National de Lille, the Brussels Philharmonic and the Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich. Since 2017 he has taught the next generation as guest professor at the Royal Conservatory of Mons, Belgium.

Praised even by the great Zubin Mehta, he is one of the violists who represent the classical world. His new album is a programme of Bach's complete suites for solo cello. He studied with Sven Arne Tepl and Nobuko Imai and plays a viola by Leroy F. Geiger from 1951.

A message from the composer

In his note on the flyer, composer Kensaku Shimizu (professor at Niigata University) writes that Marc Sabbah's playing carries "something like a prayer that cannot be put into words" – passion hidden in stillness and a deep inner life in every note. He looks forward to hearing Sabbah and Kuroiwa give the world premiere of Sumidagawa-shō, a piece inspired by the classical Noh play about a mother searching along the river for her lost child.