The founder of the Seraphin Competition, Prof. Jörg Metzger, came into contact with music at a very early age as the son of a musician and conductor. After his family was expelled from the Sudetenland in 1945, he initially received private lessons on the instruments cello and piano. Later he was accepted into the master class of Prof. Adolf Steiner at the Cologne Academy of Music. According to Jörg Metzger, he owes "everything that made up my later career" to these lessons. Consequently, he has also mentioned Prof. Adolf Steiner and his wife Hilma by name in the foundation charter of the Seraphin Foundation.

The name Seraphin Foundation is derived from the builder of Prof. Jörg Metzger's cello, the Venetian violin maker "Sanctus Seraphinus". This instrument has accompanied the founder's entire professional life and also gave its name to the "Seraphin Trio", with which he performed throughout Europe for over 25 years.

Prof. Jörg Metzger himself did not come from a wealthy family, so he financed his entire studies through scholarships and competition funds. Among other things, he received a scholarship from the Federation of German Industry and was in the selection of young artists of the German Music Council.

After a 2-year appointment as solo cellist with the Philharmonic Orchestra in Rotterdam, the first president of the HfM Würzburg, Prof. Hanns Reinartz, brought the only 26-year-old to Mainfranken as a university teacher. Jörg Metzger remained active here for 40 years.

In 1968 he was awarded the Bavarian State Prize, in 1984 the Culture Prize of the Sudeten German Association and in 1987 he was appointed a full member of the Sudeten German Academy of Sciences and Arts.

With the Seraphin Foundation, the Metzger couple would like to "give back some of the good things that have come our way".