Artists

Among the amazing talents we have discovered and presented, there are a number who have achieved international recognition as the great talents of this era and the future stars of the twenty-first century!

HELEN HUANG the 16 year old phenomenal pianist, protégé of Kurt Masur, is now renowned worldwide and performs regularly with the NY Philharmonic Series, with Washington’s National Symphony Series, the Gewandhaus Symphony and extensively throughout the world. Ms. Huang played for us at age of 11.
GIL SHAHAM was the very first artist to perform for us when we started, ten years ago. His name is now legendary. Gil Shahan is internationally recognized by noted critics and leaders of the world’s most celebrated symphonic ensembles as a veteran virtuoso of the violin. He was awarded the prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant in 1990. He plays the 1699 Countess Polignac Stradivarius
WENDY WARNER cellist, who performed for us several times, has won the prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant.
IGOR LESHISHIN, recent Salon De Virtuosi Fellowship Grant winner, has now been appointed as Principal Oboist for the Kennedy Center Opera Orchestra
The Canadian ST. LAWRENCE STRING QUARTET who appeared many times for us, are winners of the Young Concert Artists Auditions; the Banff String Ensemble Competition and are now under contract to Columbia Artists.
PHILIP QUINT, violinist and winner of the Salon De Virtuosi Diamond Fellowship Grant in 1997, has been acclaimed outstanding artist of the Spanish Sarasate Competition, and subsequently appeared with Kurt Masur at Avery Fisher Hall.
ILYA ITIN, Russian pianist, after performing for us, won the most important Leeds Competition. "Great master, his style combines ample technique, maturity, lyric fantasy, and liberty " -------Le Monde, Paris, France "A pianist of formidable accomplishment" ------The Times, London, England.
BORISLAV STRULEV, Cellist. Winner of the 1998 Salon De Virtuosi Diamond Fellowship replaced YO YO MA in concert June 1999.
TERRENCE WILSON, American pianist, our first Salon De Virtuosi Fellowship Award winner, received the prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant in 1998.
ALEJANDRO VELA, born in Mexico in 1976, eventually studied at Juilliard. He won the prestigious VLADIMIR HOROWITZ piano scholarship under the tutelage of Veda Kaplinski. Since then he has performed internationally as soloist with major symphony orchestras and has been the winner in many competitions including the Charlotte White's Salon De Virtuosi's Fellowship Grant in 1996.
KAREN GOMYO, violin phenomenon, winner of the Salon De Virtuosi Fellowship Grant in 1997. Born in Tokyo in 1982, she came to New York at the invitation of Dorothy DeLay. She was granted a full scholarship to study at Juilliard. Her debut at the 92nd Street Y received rave revues in the New York Times. The Scotland Herald said "As well as having a fantastic technique, Karen Gomyo has a real sense of dynamics, color and flair".
OLE AKAHOSHI, cellist and protégé of the noted JANOS STARKER, was the 1996 winner of the Charlotte White’s Salon De Virtuosi Fellowship Grant. This brilliant Japanese artist was born in Germany where he performed extensively before coming to the United States. Now he teaches at Yale University and performs as a member and soloist of the outstanding string ensemble, The International Sejong Soloists.
CHUAN YUN LI, violinist protégé of Dorothy De Lay. He wins the 1999 Salon De Virtuosi Fellowship Grant of $5,000.
IGOR BEGELMAN, clarinetist: The Philadelphia Inquirer writes: "Taking the clarinet where few have gone." He wins the 1999 $5,000 Salon De Virtuosi Fellowship Grant.
THE JERUSALEM TRIO, composed of Roy Shiloah, violin, Ariel Tushinsky, cello and Yaron Rosenthal, piano, have won the 1999 Arthur W. Diamond Fellowship Grant of $5,000.
JOYCE YANG, winner of the 1999 Salon De Virtuosi Sony grant, was born in Korea in 1986 and made her orchestral debut there at nine years of age. She performed Prokofiev's Concerto No. 3 with the Philadelphia Orchestra in ‘98 and in '99 played with the Juilliard Orchestra under the baton of Leonard Slatkin. She is now a student at the Juilliard Preparatory Division where she studies with Yoheved Kaplinsky.
MONIQUE McDONALD, soprano, was the 1998 winner of the Salon De Virtuosi $5000 Fellowship Grant for Voice. In 1998 she also won the George London Competition and made her New York City debut in Berlioz’ "Les Nuit D’Ete" at Town Hall. This season she took the role of Donna Anna in "Don Giovanni" at the New York City Opera where she has performed regularly. Among other outstanding performances, she appeared in were the Brahm’s "Requiem" under the baton of Lorenzo Muti and as soloist in Mozart’s "Exultate Jubilate" with the Orchestre Albert Schweitzer in Strassbourg, France.
Ori Friedman, pianist, was born in Israel in 1982 with a rich Hungarian-Polish background. He and his family now live in Canada. As winner of the Juilliard Concerto Competition he played the Liszt Totentanz with the Juilliard Symphony Orchestra at Lincoln Center to a standing ovation. He appeared for the Salon De Virtuosi in concert in January, 2000, at the Hungarian Consulate, where he was a memorable and exciting success!
Mikhail Simonyan a fourteen year-old violin prodigy from Siberia is attracting international plaudits and recognition as one of the greats of the new century
Mariko Anraku, born in Tokio, has won attention as one of the world's outstanding young harpists through numerous appearances as soloist and chamber musician in North America. Ms Anruko is principal harpist of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra. She has collaborated with renowned artists such as clarinetist Richard Stolzmann
Dmitri Berlinsky a violinist of extraordinary credentials was the youngest winner ever of the Paganini International Violin Competition in Genoa Italy. After graduating, he was invited to work with Dorothy De Lay and Masao Kawasaki at the Juilliard school in New York
Dmitri Shteinberg was born in Moscow and began his piano lessons at the age of 5. He has won innumerable international competitions including the Young artist competition in Jerusalem, first Tbilisi Piano competition in Georgia
Sarah and Susan Wang, seventeen year old twin sisters were the winners of the 2000 Murray Dranoff Young Artists International two piano competition. They have both studied piano since the age of seven with Dmitry Rachmanov at the Manhattan school of Music