The contest is taking place in Poland from 8-23 October 2016

seijiokamoto1

The 15th International Henryk Wieniawski Violin Competition, currently taking place in PoznaŠ„, Poland, has named the seven candidates chosen to progress to the finals.

The young musicians will perform Wieniawski’s First or Second Violin Concerto in addition to a selected Romantic or 20th century concerto. The competition is open to violinists of all nationalities between the ages of 16 and 30 and offers a first prize of €30,000.

Whittled down from 52 competitors chosen to take part in the live rounds, the seven finalists include 2016 Houston Symphony Ima Hogg Competition winner Luke Hsu; Tchaikovsky Competition 2015 fifth-placed finalist Bomsori Kim; 2015 Joseph Joachim Competition third prize winner Richard Lin; and 2016 Sendai International Violin Competition finalist Seiji Okamoto (pictured)

The seven finalists are:

Richard Lin (Taiwan/USA)

Ryosuke Suho (Japan)

Veriko Tchumburidze (Georgia/Turkey)

Luke Hsu (USA)

Kim Bomsori (South Korea)

Maria WŠ‚oszczowska (Poland)

Seiji Okamoto (Japan)

The 2016 jury is chaired by violinist Maxim Vengerov, who attended all preliminary selection rounds, while Krzysztof Penderecki has been named honorary chair. The remaining jurors are Alena Baeva, Zakhar Bron, Bartosz BryŠ‚a, Ilya Gringolts, Dong-Suk Kang, Konstanty Andrzej Kulka, Marios Papadopoulos (Stage 4), Mayumi Seiler, Kyoko Takezawa, Akiko Tatsumi (Stage 4), Vera Tsu and Peter Zazofsky.

Previous prize winners include Ginette Neveu, David Oistrakh, Boris Goldstein, Ida Haendel and Igor Oistrakh.

For full details visit the Wieniawski Violin Competition website.

Read: 15th International Wieniawski Violin Competition announces 52 candidates

Read: 2016 International Wieniawski Violin Competition names 13 semi-finalists