Guitarist Jürgen Ruck considers it a privilege to have been able to actively shape the role of his instrument in contemporary music for three decades, as a soloist, chamber and ensemble musician, as a university teacher and especially in his collaboration with composers.

An outstanding aspect of his artistic activity is his close association with the Frankfurt Ensemble Modern and the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. The world premieres of Frank Zappa's "Yellow Shark", Hans Zender's "Winterreise", Helmut Lachenmann's "Zwei Gefühle" and "Concertini" and Wolfgang Rihm's "Jagden und Formen", milestones of recent music history, are representative of countless projects of the Ensemble Modern in which Jürgen Ruck has been involved. In the premiere of György Kurtág's "Gravestone for Stephan" in 1991 with the Berlin Philharmonic under Zoltan Pesko and in numerous other concerts thereafter under Claudio Abbado, Peter Eötvös and Sir Simon Rattle, Ruck played the solo part; in addition, he regularly participates as a guest musician in the orchestra.

As a soloist he has performed with the Scharoun Ensemble, the Ensemble InterContemporaine Paris, the London Sinfonietta, Phace| contemporary music Vienna and the radio orchestras of WDR, NDR, SWR, SR, RAI Milan and ORF Vienna.

Ruck's repertoire includes music from the 16th century to the present. He performs in a wide variety of chamber music settings and has appeared at many international festivals.

"Jürgen Ruck (...) possesses great poetic musicality that translates seemingly effortlessly into playing thanks to his unusual technical ability. I love very much Ruck's interpretations of my music," judged Hans Werner Henze, with whom Ruck was privileged to collaborate on many occasions. Henze's important works for guitar form a special focus of his repertoire. Henze entrusted Ruck, among other things, with the arrangement and premiere of two new compositions for guitar duo. The CD recording of these works together with Elena Cásoli received an ECHO KLASSIK 2000.

For several years Jürgen Ruck has been giving very successful concerts with his project of "Caprichos Goyescos", a cycle of solo compositions written especially for him, each referring to Francisco Goya's famous etching sequence of the "Caprichos". The composers are outstanding representatives of New Music, among them are: Detlef Heusinger, José María Sánchez Verdú, Clemens Gadenstätter, Cathy Milliken, Bruno Dozza and Elena Mendoza.

Jürgen Ruck directed the guitar studio at the Darmstadt Summer Courses for New Music. At the University of Music Würzburg he has been passionately teaching a successful guitar class for 30 years.