Year of Records in Bucarest

We are extremely pleased to announce a record number of 555 competitors registered for the 19th edition of the George Enescu International Competition. This extraordinary participation, with candidates from 57 countries, underlines the ever-growing international prestige of the Enescu Competition. It is a testament to our commitment to promoting musical excellence and providing a launch pad for talented young artists from around the world. We are happy to see that our efforts to expand the reach of the competition are paying off and we look forward to witnessing the extraordinary performances of these exceptional musicians.

Conductor Cristian Măcelaru, Artistic Director of the George Enescu International Festival and Competition

The 2024 competition ended with a host of laureates in four disciplines. Two major symphony orchestras accompanied the candidates, and a great number of major artists took part in the jury panels. Among the winners:

Roman Lopatynskyi (First Prize, Piano) was born in Kyiv in 1993. As a laureate of over 20 international piano competitions, such as Hamamatsu International Piano Competition, Busoni Competition in Bolzano, Italy and V. Horowitz” International Piano Competition in Kyiv, Artur Rubinstein International Piano Master Competition, Concurs Internacional de Musica Maria Canals de Barcelona. He is one of Ukraine’s most prominent and aspiring young pianists. Roman Lopatynskyi is member of the Heidelberg Festival Academy 2017.

He is a regular guest of renowned international concert halls and festivals such as Ginza Hall, Tokyo, Steinway Hall, New York, the Mariinsky International Piano Festival, St. Petersburg, the Next Generation Festival in Bad Ragaz, Switzerland, and shared successful collaborations with the National Symphony Orchestra and the National Philharmonic of Ukraine, the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra, the German Radio Philharmonic Saarbrücken, Arena di Verona Orchestra and the Filarmonica del Teatro Comunale di Bologna. He also had a debut in Musikverein and Konzerthaus, Vienna.

Mayumi Kanagawa (First Prize, Violin), a Japanese-American violinist based in Berlin, is praised for her rich, dark sound and focused, engaging musicality, and has established herself as a versatile and refined soloist and chamber musician.
She has performed with many orchestras, including the Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra, Belgian National Orchestra, Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra, Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, in repertoire ranging from Bach to Britten and Berg. Her talent has brought her to many outreach programmes and schools around the world, from San Francisco to Novosibirsk. She is currently an ambassador for El Sistema Japan’s new Ribbon project, bringing instruments and music education to children in the foster care system. She currently performs on a 1725 Wilhelmj Antonio Stradivarius violin, generously loaned by the Nippon Music Foundation.

Yo Kitamura (First Prize, Cello)  has studied with Professor Jens Peter Maintz at the Universität der Künste in Berlin and with Professor Tsuyoshi Tsutsumi at the Toho Gakuen School of Music. He won the 1st prize at the International Johannes Brahms Competition and the 1st prize unanimously at the International Tchaikovsky Competition for Young Musicians.

Piano

Prize:
1st prize: Roman Lopatynskyi (31), Kyiv
2nd prize: Tatiana Dorokhova (33), Moscow
3rd prize: Evgeny Konnov (31), Augsburg

Jury:
Lilya Zilberstein (Chair), Vovka Ashkenazy, Luiza Borac, Dana Borșan, Martin Campbell-White, Sina Kloke, Andrei Pisarev, Alexander Shtarkman, Simon Trpčeski

Artists:
Orchestra Filharmonicii George Enescu / Christian Reif (Conductor)

Violin

Prize:
1st prize: Mayumi Kanagawa (30), Berlin
2nd prize: Hyeonjeong Lee (13), Seoul
3rd prize: Wakana Kimura (23), Vienna

Jury:
Dmitry Sitkovetsky (Chair), Boris Garlitsky, David Halen, Silvia Marcovici, Mihaela Martin, Shlomo Mintz, Liviu Prunaru, Benjamin Schwartz, Doug Sheldon

Artists:
Orchestra Filharmonicii George Enescu / Alan Buribayev (Conductor)

Cello:

Prize:
1st prize: Yo Kitamura (20), Tokyo
2nd prize: Ettore Pagano (21), Rome
3rd prize: Haddon Kay (24), Illinois

Jury:
Arto Noras (Chair), Marin Cazacu, Enrico Dindo, Leonid Gorokhov, Charlotte Lee, Dan Prelipcean, Valentin Radutiu, Meehae Ryo, Raimund Trenkler

Artists:
Romanian National Radio Orchestra / Jonathan Bloxham (Conductor)

Composition

Prize:
Chamber Music Prize: Daniele Di Virgilio (34)
Symphonic Music Prize: Voltz Alexander (25)
Originality Prize: Santamaria Diego (31)

Jury:

Zygmunt Krauze (Chair), Tim Benjamin, Dan Dediu, Jennifer Higdon, Adrian Iorgulescu, Magnus Lindberg, Gerard Mcburney, Adrian Pop, Doina Rotaru, Outi Tarkiainen, Elsa Vautrain

©︎ WFIMC / FR 2024