John Wallace
Chairman of the Jury
John Wallace became Principal of the RSAMD in 2002. Born in Methil, Fife in 1949, he learnt to play the cornet in Tullis Russell Mills Junior Band in a group of 40 young players. Subsequently his musical education embraced Buckhaven High School, which was more like an Opera Factory than a school, the National Youth Orchestra, Cambridge and York Universities, and the Royal Academy of Music. His professional playing career began with the Festival Ballet and Northern Sinfonia Orchestras, as second trumpet, and subsequently as third trumpet in the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, assistant Principal in the London Symphony Orchestra, and finally Principal Trumpet of the Philharmonia Orchestra.
Eventually he gained a reputation as a soloist after playing at the Royal Wedding of the current Patron of the RSAMD, Prince Charles, Duke of Rothesay, in 1981, and Lady Diana Spencer. He formed his own brass interest ensemble, the Wallace Collection, made many CDs, and played with orchestras as diverse as the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the Pan-African Orchestra. In 1995 he was awarded the OBE in recognition of his services to music. He brings a wide and varied background to the chairmanship of the jury of SIPC 2004 and believes that music is a primary means of communication.
Sergei Babayan
A student of such legendary musicians as Gornostayeva, Naumov, Pletnev and Vlasenko in the Moscow Conservatory, he was the first pianist from the former USSR to compete without government sponsorship after the collapse of the system. Immediately after his first trip outwith the USSR, he won first prizes in several major competitions including the Robert Casadesus and the Palm Beach international piano competitions (1990), the Hamamatsu Piano Competition (1991) and the Scottish International Piano Competition (1992). He is also a Laureate of the Queen Elizabeth, the Busoni and the Esther Honens international piano competitions. Since then he has had major engagements and concert tours throughout Europe, Japan, New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, South America and the USA.
He has appeared with many major orchestras throughout the world including the Cleveland Orchestra, the Warsaw Philharmonic, the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre Nationale de Lille, New World Symphony and the symphony orchestras of Detroit and Baltimore collaborating with such conductors as Valery Gergiev, Yuri Temirkanov, Neeme Jarvi, Hans Graf, David Robertson, Kazimierz Kord and Michael Christi.
Recently he has given recitals in New York City, London, Hannover, Manchester, Bruxelles, Glasgow, Moscow, St. Petersburg, Paris, Grenoble, Tours, Warsaw, Tokyo, Osaka, Sapporo, Philadelphia, Washington DC, Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Cleveland, Seattle, Atlanta, Miami, and New Orleans..
His recordings of Scarlatti, Ligeti, Messiaen, Mozart, Mendelssohn, Ravel, Schubert, Liszt, Vine, Respighi and Prokofiev garnered high acclaims including a “critic's choice” in the New York Times
Idil Biret
Idil Biret manifested an outstanding gift for music at the age of three and trained at the Paris Conservatoire under the tutelage of Nadia Boulanger, graduating at the age of fifteen with three first prizes. She studied piano with Alfred Cortot and was a lifelong disciple of Wilhelm Kempff who considered her his best student. Since the age of sixteen she has given recitals and concerto performances with major orchestras including the Philharmonia, the BBC Orchestras, Leningrad Philharmonic, Leipzig Gewandhaus, Dresden Staatskapelle, and such conductors as Joseph Keilberth, Gennadi Rozhdestvensky, Rudolf Kempe, Adrian Boult, Malcolm Sargent, Charles Mackerras, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, Andrew Davis and Aaron Copland.
In 1960 she made a sixteen-concert tour in the USSR at the invitation Emil Gilels. Her USA debut was in 1963, giving six performances of Rachmaninov’s Third Concerto with the Boston Symphony conducted by Erich Leinsdorf. Later that year she played the Concerto with the London Symphony under Pierre Monteux.
Idil Biret has served on the juries of many competitions including the Van Cliburn (USA), Queen Elisabeth (Belgium), Montreal (Canada), Busoni (Italy), and Liszt (Germany).
Her discography lists more than eighty records including the world premiere recording of Liszt’s transcriptions of the nine Beethoven Symphonies, the complete piano works and concertos of Chopin, Brahms and Rachmaninov, the Boulez Sonatas, and Ligeti’s Studies. In January this year, she was decorated with the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland in recognition of her recordings and performances of the works of Chopin.
Since Arnaldo Cohen attracted the attention of the critics and public, the Brazilian-born pianist has enjoyed an increasingly successful career. He has performed with such as the Royal Philharmonic, the Philharmonia, the Cleveland, the Philadelphia, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Bavarian Radio Symphony orchestras and the Santa Cecilia Orchestra of Rome. He has played with many leading conductors including Kurt Masur, Wolfgang Sawallisch and Yehudi Menuhin.
After 23 years in London, he moved to the United States where he is a professor of piano at Indiana University. His December 2006 recital at New York's historic Town Hall was hailed by The New York Times as "flawless" and as "a model of balance and imagination".
Arnaldo started his musical studies at the age of five, graduating from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro with an honours degree in piano and violin. Whilst studying engineering at university, he also worked as a professional violinist in the Rio de Janeiro Opera House Orchestra.
After studying under Jacques Klein, a pupil of William Kapell, for four years, he continued his training in Vienna under Bruno Seidlhofer and Dieter Weber. Arnaldo Cohen was awarded first prize in the 1972 Busoni International Piano Competition. Apart from making solo appearances, he has performed in the Amadeus Piano Trio and with the Lindsay, Chilingirian and Orlando quartets. Arnaldo Cohen has received an honorary fellowship from the Royal Northern College of Music and taught at the Royal Academy of Music in London.
Noriko Ogawa was awarded third prize in the 1987 Leeds International Piano Competition and has achieved considerable renown in Europe, America and in her native Japan. Recent and forthcoming concerts include recitals at Birmingham Symphony Hall, Bridgewater Hall, City of London Festival, recitals in the US, Japan, Kenya and Singapore and concerts with the BBC Scottish, Stavanger Symphony Orchestra, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, Aalborg Symphony, BBC Philharmonic and the Tokyo Symphony. In January 2007 Ogawa made her debut with the Minnesota Orchestra under Osmo Vänskä in three concerts that attracted great critical acclaim. Future plans include a solo tour of Australia and collaboration with upcoming composer Dai Fujikura.
Ogawa is also in demand as a jurist, regularly adjudicating the finals of the BBC Young Musician of the year Competition. Most recently, Ogawa served on the Jury for the Honens International Piano Competition, 2006.
Ogawa is one of the advisors for a new concert hall, the MUZA Kawasaki Symphony Hall, in her hometown. She has just been awarded the Okura Prize for her outstanding contribution to music in Japan.
Ogawa records exclusively for BIS, her latest series is the complete solo works for piano by Debussy of which volumes one, two and three (the latter two winning Editor’s Choice in the March 2003 and January 2006 editions of Gramophone Magazine respectively and chosen as CD of the week, BBC Radio 3), have met critical acclaim the world over and increased her profile as a Debussy expert.
Ronan O’Hora studied at the Royal Northern College of Music with Ryszard Bakst, winning many awards as a student there, including the Dayas Gold Medal, the Silver Medal of the Worshipful Company of Musicians and the Concerto Prize. He has performed throughout Europe as well as across the USA, Canada, Australasia and South Africa, appearing at prestigious music festivals in Salzburg, Gstaad, Ravinia, Montpelier and Brno. He has been soloist with the London Philharmonic, the Philharmonia, the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the English Chamber Orchestra, the Academy of St Martin-in-the-Fields, the Zurich Tonhalle, Indianapolis Symphony, Florida Philharmonic, Philharmonia Hungaria and Queensland Philharmonic.
His many performances on TV and radio throughout the world including a televised recital at the Chopin Society in Warsaw, a televised performance of Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 with the Netherlands Radio Symphony Orchestra and over 100 concerts on BBC Radio 3. He has recorded for EMI, Virgin Classics and other labels, concertos by Mozart, Grieg, and Tchaikowsky with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. Solo CDs include works by Schubert, Brahms, Schumann, Beethoven, Mozart, Debussy, Chopin , Mendelssohn and Satie.
Ronan O'Hora regularly gives masterclasses and sits on competition juries throughout the world. He has been Head of Keyboard Studies at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama since 1999.
Viktoria Postnikova
Viktoria Postnikova entered the Moscow Central Music School at the age of six, studied with E. B. Musaelian and made her public debut at the age of seven. At the Moscow conservatoire she joined the class of Jakob Flier. While still a student she won prizes at the Warsaw, Lisbon, Leeds and Tchaikovsky competitions.
Ms Postnikova has performed with many conductors, including Adrian Boult, Kurt Masur, Sir Colin Davis and her husband, Gennadi Rozhdestvensky. Amongst others, she has worked with the Berlin Philharmonic, Royal Concertgebouw, Santa Cecilia Rome, BBC Scottish Symphony, Orchestra of Teatro San Carlo Naples, the London orchestras, New York Philharmonic, Boston Symphony, Chicago Symphony and the Cleveland and Philadelphia orchestras. In addition to numerous tours to Europe and Japan, she has appeared with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra in South America and with the BBC Symphony Orchestra in Australia and the Far East.
She has recorded all three Tchaikovsky Concerti for Decca, the Busoni Piano Concerto as well as the complete piano music of Tchaikovsky, Janacek and Glinka for Erato, violin sonatas by R. Strauss and Busoni for Chandos and the complete piano concerti of Brahms, Chopin and Prokofiev among many other recordings for Melodia.
She is also an accomplished chamber musician, having given concerts in the CIS and France with Yehudi Menuhin featuring the complete Brahms violin and piano sonatas along with sonatas by Mozart, Beethoven and Bartok.
Piano magazine recently described Susan Tomes as ‘one of the brightest jewels in Britain’s cultural crown’. Susan was the first woman to study music at King’s College, Cambridge, which had been an exclusively male college for 400 years. She was a founder member and for fifteen years the pianist of the award-winning group Domus. In 1995 she co-founded the Florestan Trio, now one of the world’s leading piano trios. The trio won a 1999 Gramophone Award and the Royal Philharmonic Award 2000. All their records are recommended choices in collectors’ guides. Susan’s discography comprises over forty-five CDs, several of them winning awards. She also enjoys giving solo recitals and playing concertos; she has recently appeared as a soloist with the Academy of St Martin in the Fields, the Manchester Camerata, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, Grand Rapids Symphony, and the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.
Writing about music has become an important part of her life. She writes occasional articles for The Guardian, reviews music books for The Independent, and has her own page on the Guardian’s new ‘Comment is free’ website. She has also appeared as a writer and presenter on BBC Radio 3 and Radio 4. In 2004 her book Beyond the Notes was a Critics’ Choice in numerous publications. Her second book, A Musician’s Alphabet, was published by Faber in 2006 and was Classic FM’s Book of the Month, a Christmas Books choice in The Times, a Book of the Year in The Herald, and one of the Best Biographies in The Independent.
Judith Weir
Judith Weir is one of Britain’s most wide-ranging composers. She studied composition with John Tavener whilst at school in London, and at Cambridge University with Robin Holloway. For six years she taught composition at Glasgow's University and RSAMD and she has also held visiting professorships at Oxford and Princeton. She is an active advocate of new music for school-age and adult amateur performers.
Her interest in theatre, narrative and folklore has resulted in three full length operas, 'A Night at the Chinese Opera', 'The Vanishing Bridegroom' and 'Blond Eckbert'; and theatrical collaborations with Sir Peter Hall, Caryl Churchill and Peter Shaffer. Together with storyteller Vayu Naidu, Judith has created a blend of storytelling and music entitled 'Future Perfect' which has toured England and India; a new instalment of which was premiered in 2005.
She has composed for specific artists including Jessye Norman, Sir Simon Rattle and the CBSO orchestra and its three choruses (winner of the 2000 South Bank Show Music Award); the Schubert Ensemble, and Alice Coote. Judith recently completed 'Armida', an opera for television in collaboration with film-maker Margaret Williams, commissioned by Channel Four TV.
From 1995 to 1998 she was the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra's Composer in Association; and from 1995 to 2000 she was the Artistic Director of the Spitalfields Festival in London.
Judith Weir’s music is published exclusively by Chester Music Ltd. and Novello and Co. Ltd.
