Toni Stricker was born in Vienna in 1930. His mother
was Viennese, his father from Burgenland. At the age of six he began
learning the violin and went on to receive an extensive classical
musical training at the City of Vienna Conservatory. In the years
that followed he performed in numerous jazz clubs and dance halls, usually
playing with his own band. Over the years he made a name for himself
as a mainstream swing
musician and was invited to appear at concerts and gala performances
and to record in gramophone, radio and television studios in almost
every country in Europe.
On his return to Vienna,
Toni Stricker started composing and arranging. Having spent six years
as the leader of the Theater an der Wien orchestra, he was much in demand
as an all-round musical talent. He wrote
music for his own concert performances but also for feature films,
television productions, fairy-tales and ballets and for a large number
of famous actors,
singers and stars of the entertainment world.
In the mid-seventies Toni Stricker ended his successful career as a freelance musician from one day to the next and built a house in the Burgenland town of Bad Sauerbrunn, where he and his family went to live. Since then he has embraced the motto "Strip yourself down to the bare essentials" and has explored the roots of his own creative personality. The harmonious straight-forwardness of the people of Burgenland and the scenic beauty of the Pannonian landscape invest Toni Stricker's creative work with deeply felt meaning.
His foremost aspiration is to capture in his compositions the moods of this countryside and the rich blend of influences which make up its culture. His profound allegiance to the character and traditions of Pannonia and his unmistakable, inimitable violin-playing have given birth to a whole new style: "Pannonian Music". In lovingly fostering this musical idiom for decades, he has established himself as an illustrious ambassador of the region's culture.
Since moving to Burgenland, this charismatic performer's life has followed a tireless creative cycle: composing, arranging, producing and performing - and that for decades now.
Today Toni Stricker is equally at home on the stage and in recording studios in Paris and Vienna, Berlin and Munich, Bratislava and Rome, New York, Chicago and Toronto. He shares his free time among his various domiciles - in Burgenland, in Vienna and on the Côte d'Azur.