Elen Lura Haakensen

My education: Barrat Dues Music Institute, Oslo and Edsberg Music Institute, Stockholm.

My favorite musical composition: The St. Matthew and St. John Passions by J.S. Bach.

My greatest musical experience: When I as a young girl listened to the St. John Passion for the first time at a concert at Stavanger Cathedral. My mother sang in the choir and my stepfather conducted. I remember sitting in the first row with no expectations at all. But when the music began I nearly fell off my seat in amazement.
I had never heard anything that beautiful. I love Bach and his passions but still haven’t performed any of them. I hope to experience this some time during my musical life.

My most memorable/funny/unusual experience in the Kapel: The Sonning Prize concert with Simon Rattle. It was one of those concerts where the orchestra felt like one big throbbing heart.

When I’m not playing in the Kapel: I love times spent with my kids being creative. When the living room becomes an inferno of various materials including beads, cloth, scissors and glue I’m in heaven. I also love playing chamber music and a couple of years ago, together with my husband, I started the Fejø Chamber Music Festival.