16 quarter-finalists will compete in Queenstown and Auckland, New Zealand, in May and June 2026 for a prize pool valued at over NZD$100,000
New Zealand’s Michael Hill International Violin Competition has announced its competitors for the 2026 edition, coinciding with the competition’s 25th anniversary.
The competition, supported by the Hill Family Foundation for Arts and Music, will take place in Queenstown and Auckland, New Zealand, from 29 May to 6 June 2026.
The 16 quarter-finalists are as follows, listed along with the city in which they reside or from where they originate:
Beatrice Colombis (Sydney/Berlin)
Anais Feller (Vancouver/Washington)
Emmalena Huning (Perth)
Yeonoo Jeong (Seoul)
Hyein Koo (Seoul)
Hairui Lei (Philadelphia)
Tianyou Ma (New York)
Leanne McGowan (Brisbane/Berlin)
Jakow Pavlenko (Berlin)
Alexey Stychkin (Berlin)
Maxim Tzekov (Berlin)
Dindin Jingyi Wang (Melbourne)
Ruiyi Wang (Shanghai)
Sophie Wang (Berlin)
Rino Yoshimoto (Vienna)
Xunyue Zhang (Berlin)
There are also six alternates who will be invited to step in if any of the selected competitors are unable to compete. They are, in order: Julia Wang (Vienna), Yebin Yoo (Melbourne), Zixuan Shen (Beijing), Leyang Tang (Berlin), Nicholas Hammel (Austin) and Sara Schlumberger-Ruiz (Berlin).
The winner will receive NZ$40,000, a recording contract with the Atoll label, and a multi-centre Winner’s Tour with Chamber Music New Zealand and Auckland Philharmonia.
Additional prizes will be available, including the Best Performance of a New Zealand Commissioned Work, the Chamber Music Prize, and the Sheila Smith Prize, which comprises a three-year loan of a Domenico Montagnana violin, facilitated by Rare Violins of New York.
The selection of the quarter-finalists was made by a panel comprising Nikki Chooi (2013 winner and concertmaster, Buffalo Philharmonic and Santa Fe Opera Orchestra), Vesa-Matti Leppänen (concertmaster, New Zealand Symphony Orchestra), Andrew Beer (oncertmaster, Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra), Amalia Hall (violinist, NZTrio) and Mark Menzies (professor of music at University of Canterbury, New Zealand).
The judging panel for the competition in 2026 will comprise an international line-up of the violin world: James Ehnes, Ed Dusinberre, Josef Špaček, Geneva Lewis, Vera Tsu Weiling, Andrew Beer and Natsuko Yoshimoto.
The first two rounds of the competition will take place in Queenstown, following which, six competitors will be selected to compete in the semi-finals in Auckland. Here, the violinists will perform piano quintets with the NZTrio and violist Rob Ashworth.
The competition’s Grand Final will see three finalists perfom a concerto each with the Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra in Auckland’s Town Hall on 6 June 2026.
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