The core of Ensemble Orion comprises the violinist Noëlle-Anne Darbellay and her brother, french horn player Olivier Darbellay.
The internationally active siblings play in various configurations, augmenting the ensemble with outstanding guest musicians. The unique and wide-spread repertoire of Ensemble Orion includes works from the baroque – played on period instruments - up until to the music of our time.
The family ties are completed by the composer Jean-Luc Darbellay, Noëlle-Anne and Olivier’s father, whose works are regularly featured in the ensemble’s programmes.
The Ensemble Orion has performed throughout Europe, North America and Asia.
It has been a guest in renowned concert series including the Julliard School New York, the Goethe-Institute in Tokyo, the Deutschlandfunk series at the Arithmeum Bonn, the Händel-Haus Halle, the Philharmonie Luxembourg, the Grand Théâtre d’Angers, the 70 Years Bauhaus Celebration by MDR in Dessau, the Tonhalle Düsseldorf, the Fondazione Merz in Turin, the World Exhibition in Saragossa and as well as significant Museums such as the Albertina Vienna.
Furthermore, Ensemble Orion received invitations by festivals such as Sion Festival, World New Music Days, International Music Festival Odessa, Eté Musicale de Roisin, Swiss Chamber Music Festival, Hirzenberg Festival, Murten Classics, Rencontres musicales de Champéry, Aspekte Salzburg, Schubertiade d’Espace2, Festival Franco-Anglais de Poésie Paris, Festival du Jura, the Berner Seefestspiele and the Torshavn Summer Festival on the Faroe Islands.
The projects are often supplemented by educational events, masterclasses and exchanges with ensembles from abroad.
Together with pianist Benjamin Engeli, Olivier and Noëlle-Anne Darbellay recorded 2018 the Brahms and Koechlin trios for Challenge records. In the spring of 2022 another highly acclaimed recording was released by Claves Records with song cycles for soprano and strings by Berg, Darbellay and Mahler, for which Noëlle-Anne Darbellay was joined by soprano Lisa Tatin, violinist Joakim Cumont-Vioque, violist Julie Le Gac and cellist René Camacaro.
Huge applause for a fascinating evening - Ensemble Orion inspires at Deutschlandfunk’s concert series ‘Concerto discreto’ in the Arithmeum in Bonn. (General-Anzeiger Bonn)
How beautifully the wind textures caressed each other - and how ghostly the string sounds died away... An evening of high aesthetics and arresting depth of expression by the promising Ensemble Orion. (Der Bund)
Classica's favourite – CD Berg Darbellay Mahler
[...] The breathtaking quality of the timbres and phrasing of each musician provides the whole cycle with a rare intensity, particularly at the end of the last Lied. (Classica)
More than pocket size – CD Berg Darbellay Mahler
[...] Lisa Tatin and the strings of the Ensemble Orion give these late Romantic and early Modernist works an intensity that neither the orchestra nor the piano can match. This is partly due to the instrumentalists, who provide vibrant energy without overdoing it. The soprano is not to be outdone: Lisa Tatin relies on a compelling melody that sometimes relegates the spoken word to the background. [...]
[...] A fascinating disc that categorically rules out superficial listening.
(Music&Theatre)
With their colourful and flawlessly intoned playing, siblings Noëlle-Anne Darbellay (violin) and Olivier Darbellay (horn), guaranteed a captivating concert of the highest musical intensity. (Mindener Tagblatt)
[...] The fact that all the protagonists are also at home in the classical-traditional field is proven by their enormously colourful and sometimes playful, sometimes lost-in-musing interpretation of the Brahms trio. Charles Koechlin's early miniatures breathe the Parisian air on the threshold of the fin de siècle, and cautiously approach modernity. An exemplary programme that harmoniously combines old and new. (Musik&Theater)
The intimate aesthetic of the three song cycles in this chamber music rendering is utterly convincing. One could even say that this simplicity enhances the poetic scope of the songs, drawing us in with hushed steps into an inner space where the music fills the absences described in the song texts. [..]
The pearl of this recording is the cycle of "Sept poèmes romands", written in 1986 by Jean-Luc Darbellay, a composer with close family ties with Ensemble Orion. Through their delicate expressivity, Lisa Tatin and the string trio give prominence to this remarkable work of meditative character, in which absence and presence intertwine and fade into silence on wonderfully transparent textures and forays into areas of twelve-tone music.
(Le Courrier)
With the humorous "Frog-Parthia" by Leopold Mozart, Noëlle-Anne Darbellay, René Camacaro and Jim Vanderspar drew fascinating, virtuosic pictures of a resting landscape, radiating life and beauty. (Der Murtenbieter)
The interpretation of the thoughtful trio for piano, violin and horn Opus 40 by Johannes Brahms is a stroke of luck: the two Darbellay siblings are joined by the excellent Swiss pianist Benjamin Engeli – The three abound in powerful, subtle and technically flawless interplay. (Schweizer Musikzeitung)
Viennese humour and witty sounds? That's not usually the first thing that comes to mind in 20th-century music. Unless you are dealing with the Swiss Ensemble Orion. In a string quartet formation, the ensemble gathers songs by Alban Berg, Gustav Mahler, and Swiss composer Jean-Luc Darbellay in an album full of cello warmth and spherical, calm sounds that embrace, surround, and coat soprano Lisa Tatin so that an overall shimmering sound emerges from the vocal lines, in which sometimes the singing, sometimes the accompaniment, takes over. (NZZ am Sonntag)
The internationally active siblings play in various configurations, augmenting the ensemble with outstanding guest musicians. The unique and wide-spread repertoire of Ensemble Orion includes works from the baroque – played on period instruments - up until to the music of our time.
The family ties are completed by the composer Jean-Luc Darbellay, Noëlle-Anne and Olivier’s father, whose works are regularly featured in the ensemble’s programmes.
The Ensemble Orion has performed throughout Europe, North America and Asia.
It has been a guest in renowned concert series including the Julliard School New York, the Goethe-Institute in Tokyo, the Deutschlandfunk series at the Arithmeum Bonn, the Händel-Haus Halle, the Philharmonie Luxembourg, the Grand Théâtre d’Angers, the 70 Years Bauhaus Celebration by MDR in Dessau, the Tonhalle Düsseldorf, the Fondazione Merz in Turin, the World Exhibition in Saragossa and as well as significant Museums such as the Albertina Vienna.
Furthermore, Ensemble Orion received invitations by festivals such as Sion Festival, World New Music Days, International Music Festival Odessa, Eté Musicale de Roisin, Swiss Chamber Music Festival, Hirzenberg Festival, Murten Classics, Rencontres musicales de Champéry, Aspekte Salzburg, Schubertiade d’Espace2, Festival Franco-Anglais de Poésie Paris, Festival du Jura, the Berner Seefestspiele and the Torshavn Summer Festival on the Faroe Islands.
The projects are often supplemented by educational events, masterclasses and exchanges with ensembles from abroad.
Together with pianist Benjamin Engeli, Olivier and Noëlle-Anne Darbellay recorded 2018 the Brahms and Koechlin trios for Challenge records. In the spring of 2022 another highly acclaimed recording was released by Claves Records with song cycles for soprano and strings by Berg, Darbellay and Mahler, for which Noëlle-Anne Darbellay was joined by soprano Lisa Tatin, violinist Joakim Cumont-Vioque, violist Julie Le Gac and cellist René Camacaro.
Selection press excerpts
Huge applause for a fascinating evening - Ensemble Orion inspires at Deutschlandfunk’s concert series ‘Concerto discreto’ in the Arithmeum in Bonn. (General-Anzeiger Bonn)
How beautifully the wind textures caressed each other - and how ghostly the string sounds died away... An evening of high aesthetics and arresting depth of expression by the promising Ensemble Orion. (Der Bund)
Classica's favourite – CD Berg Darbellay Mahler
[...] The breathtaking quality of the timbres and phrasing of each musician provides the whole cycle with a rare intensity, particularly at the end of the last Lied. (Classica)
More than pocket size – CD Berg Darbellay Mahler
[...] Lisa Tatin and the strings of the Ensemble Orion give these late Romantic and early Modernist works an intensity that neither the orchestra nor the piano can match. This is partly due to the instrumentalists, who provide vibrant energy without overdoing it. The soprano is not to be outdone: Lisa Tatin relies on a compelling melody that sometimes relegates the spoken word to the background. [...]
[...] A fascinating disc that categorically rules out superficial listening.
(Music&Theatre)
With their colourful and flawlessly intoned playing, siblings Noëlle-Anne Darbellay (violin) and Olivier Darbellay (horn), guaranteed a captivating concert of the highest musical intensity. (Mindener Tagblatt)
[...] The fact that all the protagonists are also at home in the classical-traditional field is proven by their enormously colourful and sometimes playful, sometimes lost-in-musing interpretation of the Brahms trio. Charles Koechlin's early miniatures breathe the Parisian air on the threshold of the fin de siècle, and cautiously approach modernity. An exemplary programme that harmoniously combines old and new. (Musik&Theater)
The intimate aesthetic of the three song cycles in this chamber music rendering is utterly convincing. One could even say that this simplicity enhances the poetic scope of the songs, drawing us in with hushed steps into an inner space where the music fills the absences described in the song texts. [..]
The pearl of this recording is the cycle of "Sept poèmes romands", written in 1986 by Jean-Luc Darbellay, a composer with close family ties with Ensemble Orion. Through their delicate expressivity, Lisa Tatin and the string trio give prominence to this remarkable work of meditative character, in which absence and presence intertwine and fade into silence on wonderfully transparent textures and forays into areas of twelve-tone music.
(Le Courrier)
With the humorous "Frog-Parthia" by Leopold Mozart, Noëlle-Anne Darbellay, René Camacaro and Jim Vanderspar drew fascinating, virtuosic pictures of a resting landscape, radiating life and beauty. (Der Murtenbieter)
The interpretation of the thoughtful trio for piano, violin and horn Opus 40 by Johannes Brahms is a stroke of luck: the two Darbellay siblings are joined by the excellent Swiss pianist Benjamin Engeli – The three abound in powerful, subtle and technically flawless interplay. (Schweizer Musikzeitung)
Viennese humour and witty sounds? That's not usually the first thing that comes to mind in 20th-century music. Unless you are dealing with the Swiss Ensemble Orion. In a string quartet formation, the ensemble gathers songs by Alban Berg, Gustav Mahler, and Swiss composer Jean-Luc Darbellay in an album full of cello warmth and spherical, calm sounds that embrace, surround, and coat soprano Lisa Tatin so that an overall shimmering sound emerges from the vocal lines, in which sometimes the singing, sometimes the accompaniment, takes over. (NZZ am Sonntag)
