OUR TEAM
EDUCATIONAL DIRECTOR (VOLUNTEER)
Dr. Alexander Saier
Dr. Alexander Saier was born in Freiburg im Breisgau. As the son of a school principal and a primary school teacher, Saier has been familiar with pedagogy from an early age. Perhaps for this very reason, he became intrigued by how leaders, particularly teachers, succeed in getting people to do what is required of them.
He learned that this has much to do with body language and posture during his time as a percussionist, playing with the city music association, the state youth orchestra, and eventually at the music conservatory. Saier studied percussion (specializing in timpani) with Lukas Lindenmeyer in Basel.
In 1998, he left his instrumental studies to pursue music education and musicology. Under the guidance of his mentor, Prof. Gernot Schulz (solo percussionist of the Berlin Philharmonic), Alexander Saier shifted his focus to music education, studying musicology in Berlin, Vienna, and Halle (Saale). In 2002 he was honoured with a scholarship from the Carl Orff – Foundation.
In 2009 Saier began teaching in schools, eventually transitioning entirely to school service.
That same year, he completed his dissertation with distinction under Wolfgang Auhagen and Sebastian Klotz in Halle (Saale). He then began establishing a music department for the Würth Foundation at the Freie Schule Anne-Sophie in Berlin, where he developed the “Jugend dirigiert” project. Since then, Saier has dedicated himself to working with and for children. In 2021, he was honored with the newly established Humanismus Stiftung’s “Youth Shapes the Future” award.
CONDUCTOR
Thomas Hennig
Thomas Hennig studied at the Hanover University of Music, Drama, and Media, as well as musicology and philosophy in Osnabrück. His education was further refined through masterclasses in conducting held in Vienna, Munich, and Biel.
He spent six years engaged at the Brandenburg Theater and has been the conductor of the Berlin Oratorio Choir for 15 years. International engagements have taken him to the State Opera Antalya, Brazil, Nigeria, the United States, and Ulaanbaatar, where he served as musical director for The Magic Flute at the Mongolian State Opera. In a gala concert, he introduced Mongolian audiences to the music of Richard Wagner for the first time with the prelude to Tristan und Isolde.
Since 2012, Thomas Hennig has been the principal conductor of the Neue Preußische Philharmonie Berlin. He is also a regular guest conductor with the Brandenburg State Orchestra Frankfurt, the Brandenburg Symphony Orchestra, the Prussian Chamber Orchestra, and the Berlin Symphony Orchestra.
Thomas Hennig is also a prolific composer. His works include a piano concerto premiered in 2002 in Baltimore and a trumpet concerto written for Reinhold Friedrich. In 2019, he completed the unfinished works Nacht and Besinnung by Richard Strauss, which were performed in 2021 by Christian Thielemann at the Semperoper Dresden and the Vienna Musikverein.
MANAGER OF THE CAPITAL SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
Asensio Argiler Grau
Born in Bigastro, a village near Alicante in southern Spain, music has always been an integral part of Asensio Argilér Grau’s life, leading him to pursue it as a career. In Berlin, he studied trombone under Prof. Christhard Gössling (Berlin Philharmonic) at the Hanns Eisler School of Music. He later completed his master’s degree with Prof. Thomas Leyendecker (Deutsche Oper) at the Mendelssohn Bartholdy University of Music and Theatre in Leipzig.
As a musician, he was a member of the Joven Orquesta Nacional de España and the Gustav Mahler Academy. He also regularly performs with renowned orchestras such as the Staatskapelle Berlin, Deutsche Oper, Belgian National Orchestra, Orquesta Sinfónica de Madrid, Malta Philharmonic, Orquesta do Porto, and the Herbert von Karajan Academy. He has worked under renowned conductors, including Semyon Bychkov, Zubin Mehta, Plácido Domingo, Peter Eötvös, and Pablo Heras-Casado.
As an educator, he has taught trombone, tuba, and euphonium at the Kreismusikschule Potsdam-Mittelmark and has organized courses for JUGEND DIRIGIERT.
Since 2024, Asensio is pursuing a master’s degree in cultural management at Universitat Oberta de Catalunya. In this capacity, he has also assumed the educational leadership of JUGEND DIRIGIERT.