Creating a sonorous enrichment for the cultural landscape
The Förderverein der Musikhochschule Münster was founded in 1985 to support young musical and artistic talent in the context of university education. Our aim is to provide talented students with the best possible conditions for their musical development and to accompany them on their way to becoming professional musicians.
We want to help create a vibrant and inspiring musical community characterized by diversity and openness. Our aim is to help students, regardless of their cultural background, origin or physical abilities, to develop their musical talents. Through our commitment, we want to help the University of Music Münster as a center of excellent musical education and artistic innovation and contribute to the promotion of an inclusive and open society.
Support for special artistic and music education projects
We support outstanding projects that strengthen the artistic and educational profile of the profile of the Münster University of Music. Through financial resources and organizational support, we enable students to implement innovative ideas and important artistic ideas and important artistic projects, such as participation in national and international competitions or external master classes.
Support in cases of social hardship
We stand by students in difficult life situations and offer financial support and personal advice. Our aim is to ensure that no talented student has to miss out on their musical education due to financial difficulties at Münster University of Music.
Promotion of public performances by students
We promote the musical career development of students by giving them the opportunity to present their skills to a wide audience. By organizing and financing university concerts and other public concerts and other public performances, we create platforms for professional professional performance and support students in gaining important experience in with the audience and the stage.
Help with the purchase of instruments and sheet music
We make it easier for students to gain access to high-quality instruments and sheet music by providing financial support for the purchase or loan of instruments. In this way, we want to ensure that all students have the best possible working conditions and can concentrate fully on their can concentrate fully on their musical education.
Support the association
with a contribution!
If it is also important to you to support our young musicians and thus help the future cultural landscape to flourish cultural landscape, we would like to invite you to become a member of the association. The annual membership fee is €30 and is tax deductible.
The new prize from the Friends of the University of Music
Since 2025, the Förderverein der Musikhochschule Münster e. V. has been awarding the Münster STELLA Award to students who have already demonstrated exceptional artistic talent and achievements during their studies. The award comes with prize money and offers the winners an exclusive concert opportunity and, if desired, a professional recording of their award-winning concert.
The very limited number of tickets for this special concert is only available through the Förderverein. The ticket distribution details will be announced here, on Facebook and Instagram and in the local press 4 - 6 weeks before the prizewinners' concert.
The association plans to present the Münster STELLA Award annually and to award either the Münster STELLA Award Klassik to students of the classical music department or the Münster STELLA Award Pop to students of the pop department of the University of Music. This award will not only recognise and promote artistic excellence, but also outstanding concert and competition successes or publications.
Münster STELLA Award 2025 Classical for Fatjona Maliqi
The winner of the 1st Münster STELLA Award 2025 Classical Music is Fatjona Maliqi, concert exam student from Prof Heribert Koch's piano class.
The award ceremony and the prizewinners' concert took place on 18 May at the Erbdrostenhof in Münster. The baroque aristocratic palace is one of Münster's most important architectural monuments, built according to the plans of Johann Conrad Schlaun. The exquisite ambience of its ballroom provided the perfect setting for Fatjona Maliqi's performance of Johann Sebastian Bach's virtuoso and meditative ‘Goldberg Variations’. - We would like to thank the Landschaftsverband Westfalen-Lippe (LWL) for its hospitality! - Thanks also go to Mayor Klaus Rosenau, who, as a representative of the City of Münster, expressed his appreciation for the voluntary work of the Friends of Münster and was deeply impressed by the prizewinner's performance. Fatjona Maliqi interpreted the 80-minute work with somnambulistic confidence, expressiveness, virtuosity and elegance. The audience thanked her with standing ovations that lasted several minutes, and the local press gave the young concert pianist a comprehensive appraisal.
has made a name for herself as a soloist with a preference for unusually demanding programmes, impressing ‘with forcefulness and finesse’ (Piano News). She has recently gained particular recognition for her performance of the Goldberg Variations by J. S. Bach, which she plays ‘as if everything were very simple’ (Bonner Generalanzeiger). At the prestigious 7th International Rosalyn Tureck Bach Competition in New York, she was honoured as a finalist with a prize for her interpretation of the Goldberg Variations. Her recent Asian debut at the German Consulate General in Karachi (Pakistan) met with an enthusiastic response and the national daily newspaper Dawn wrote under the headline ‘Brilliant Bach and magnificent Maliqi’ of the ‘delightful combination of heart and mind’ that characterises her Bach playing. For her DVD project with the Goldberg Variations, which she presented at the end of her Master's programme at the Münster University of Music, she received the rarely awarded rating ‘with distinction’.
The Kosovo-born pianist won numerous prizes as a teenager and has made impressive artistic progress since starting her studies at Münster University of Music in autumn 2016. She mastered her bachelor's and master's degrees with flying colours and is currently working towards her concert exam, the highest possible artistic qualification. She won first prize in the university competition and qualified twice for live concerts in the ‘WDR3 Campus Concerts’ series, in which the best students from music universities in NRW are presented. Outside the university, she performs internationally with various solo programmes, as a soloist in piano concertos by Beethoven, Chopin, Grieg, Clara Schumann, Saint-Saëns, Rachmaninov, Gershwin and Shostakovich and as a chamber musician in various formations.
After 15 years as 1st Chair of the Friends of the Münster University of Music, Ms. Rieke-Baumeister stepped down from her position on April 10, 2024.
The Dean of the University of Music, Prof. Stephan Froleyks, and the new board elected at the general meeting expressed their thanks and congratulations on her many years of service.
The support association of the University of Music was founded in 1985 to support young musical and artistic talent in the context of university education. The aim of the association is to provide talented students with the best possible conditions for their musical development and to accompany them on their way to becoming professional musicians.
