Vita

Richard Verna was born in Würzburg in 2001, the son of two professional musicians. He received his 1st cello lessons at the age of 5 with Professor Speermann at the Hochschule für Musik Würzburg.
In 2011 he continued his studies with Deanna Talens ( student of David Geringas) principal cellist of the Mainfranken Theater Würzburg. He is currently studying at the Hochschule für Musik in Saarbrücken in the class of Gustav Rivinius. Master classes with artists and professors such as Jens Peter Maintz, Wolfgang Emanuel Schmidt, Wolfgang Böttcher, Stefan Popov, Gustav Rivinius, Orfeo Mandozzi and others gave him additional impulses. 

He has just qualified for the federal selection of the German National Academic Foundation.

At Jugend musiziert he has repeatedly won 1st national prizes with full marks in the solo and duo categories with special prizes from the Stiftung Musikleben in Hamburg and the Sparkassen special prize. Richard Verna is a scholarship holder of the Jürgen Ponto Foundation.

At the International Summer Academy in Radolfzell, he was awarded a special prize for outstanding performance in both 2016 and 2017. 

In 2017, as the first youngest prize winner, he was awarded the Cultural Promotion Prize of the City of Würzburg.
At the 2017 Inge Murjahn Competition of the Da Ponte Foundation Darmstadt, he earned a 1st prize. 

Richard Verna can already look back on a busy concert career as a soloist. At the age of 14, he made his debut at the Kissinger Winterzauber with an independent recital. With the Philharmonic Orchestra Würzburg it performed the Elgar Cello Concerto conducted by Marie Jacquot, Tchaikovsky's Rococo Variations with the Philharmonic Orchestra Heidelberg conducted by Oliver Pols and with the Southwest German Philharmonic Orchestra he performed the 3rd movement of the Dvorak Cello Concerto as part of the international conducting master classes. In 2019, he performed the Dvorak Cello Concerto with the Würzburg Philharmonic Orchestra. Several times he performed at the concert series in Dreieich Buchschlag and at the concert series Kleines Hauskonzert in Bad Mergentheim. In 2015 he was invited by the Arbanassi music festival in Bulgaria to perform as a soloist. 

He has also been able to collaborate with eminent figures in chamber music at renowned festivals. Such as at the Kronberg Academy "Musik Miteinander" with Andrej Bielow and Adrien Boisseau, at the chamber music course of the Bavarian State Youth Orchestra in Amberg, resulting in a recording with the BR of the Schubert Quintet in C major, which was broadcast on BR radio, or at the International Chamber Music Course and Festival in Belgium "musica mundi". There he also performed as a soloist and was taught by world-renowned artists such as Ivry Gitlis, Leonid Kerbel, Vladimir Perlin, Stefan Popov, Szymanowski Quartet, Herlem String Quartet, Hagit Hassid Kerbel and many others. 

Since 2017 he is a scholarship holder of the Deutsche Stiftung Musikleben in Hamburg and plays a cello by Sébastian Philippe Bernadel, Paris 1838, a fiduciary loan from family property, from the Deutschen Musikinstrumentenfonds.