The Bavarian Radio competition offers cash prizes and numerous performance opportunities

Ard collage

ARD 2019 cello competitors

The 2019 ARD International Music Competition offers four categories: cello, clarinet, bassoon and percussion. In each category there is a first prize of €10,000, plus cash prizes for second and third place, a number of special prizes, and a host of paid performance opportunities.

Launched in 1952, the competition focuses each year on different instrumental categories, selected from 21 disciplines.

This year’s cello event begins on 4 September and culminates in the 13 September final with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in which the three remaining candidates will perform their choice of the Elgar, Schumann, Shostakovich no.2 and Martinů no.2 concertos.

The competition has invited a total 64 cellists and 20 piano trios to its live rounds in Munich in September.

They are:

  • Riana Anthony, USA 
  • Beata Antikainen, Finland 
  • Friederike Luise Arnholdt, Germany 
  • Basile Ausländer, France / Switzerland 
  • Joel Blido, Germany 
  • Nepomuk Braun, Germany 
  • Konstantin Bruns, Germany 
  • Pin-Jyun Chen, Taiwan 
  • Min Suk Cho, South Korea 
  • Ye Lin (Stella) Cho, South Korea 
  • Hayoung Choi, South Korea 
  • Yehjin Chun, South Korea 
  • Elia Cohen-Weissert, Germany / Israel 
  • John-Henry Crawford, USA 
  • Christoph Croisé, Germany / France / Switzerland 
  • Simone Drescher, Germany 
  • Chiara Enderle Samatanga, Switzerland 
  • Rolando Fernandez, Mexico 
  • Jeremias Fliedl, Austria 
  • Jérémy Garbarg, France
  • Wassily Gerassimez, Germany 
  • Johannes Gray, United States 
  • Fedor Grigoriev, Russia 
  • Anouchka Hack, Germany 
  • Sihao He, China 
  • Christoph Heesch, Germany 
  • Natania Hoffman, Italy / USA 
  • Stéphanie Huang, Belgium 
  • Raphaël Jouan, France 
  • Minji Kang, South Korea 
  • Ivan Karizna, Belarus 
  • Min Ji Kim, South Korea 
  • Stanislas Kim, France 
  • Marcel Johannes Kits, Estonia 
  • Anastasia Kobekina, Russia 
  • Maciej Kulakowski, Poland 
  • Benjamin Lai, USA / Taiwan 
  • Christine JeongHyoun Lee, South Korea 
  • Kanghyun Lee, South Korea 
  • Yeong-Kwang Lee, South Korea 
  • Olivier Marger, France 
  • Laura Moinian, Germany
  • Guilherme Nardelli Monegatto, Brazil 
  • Dilshod Narzillaev, Uzbekistan 
  • Erica Piccotti, Italy 
  • Florian Pons, France 
  • Nadège Rochat, France / Switzerland 
  • Senja Rummukainen, Finland 
  • Haruma Sato, Japan 
  • Andreas Schmalhofer, Germany 
  • Katarina Schmidt, Germany / Sweden 
  • Oleksiy Shadrin, Ukraine 
  • Lev Sivkov, Russia 
  • Ivan Skanavi, Russia 
  • Anton Spronk, Netherlands / Switzerland 
  • Sayaka Selina Studer, Japan / Switzerland 
  • Ildikó Szabó, Hungary 
  • Laura Szabó, Hungary 
  • Friedrich Thiele, Germany 
  • Michiaki Ueno, Japan 
  • Volodia Van Keulen, France 
  • Guillaume Wang, Australia 
  • Sul Yoon, South Korea

Chaired by American cellist Lynn Harrell, the jury comprises Ophélie Gaillard, Matt Haimovitz, Maria Kliegel, Torleif Thedéen, Tamás Varga and Pieter Wispelwey.

The ARD Competition has helped to launch the careers of a number of leading musicians throughout the years, including Yuri Bashmet, Christian Tetzlaff, Antoine Tamestit, Jessye Norman, Mitsuko Uchida, Thomas Quasthoff and Heinz Holliger. The most recent cello winner was István Várdai in 2014 (see his finals performance below).