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Bowdoin Festival Announces New Virtuosi ProgramBRUNSWICK - Four extraordinary young musicians have been selected as Bowdoin Virtuosi, a new program created for the 2010 season of the Bowdoin International Music Festival. Participants, who are among the most accomplished emerging talent worldwide, are invited to perform with Bowdoin Festival faculty and engage in individually designed study programs to benefit their artistic growth and careers. Nominees are all winners of international competitions or performers who have appeared with major orchestras. This year’s Virtuosi, announced by Artistic Director Lewis Kaplan, are violinists Ray Chen, David Coucheron, and Suyoen Kim, and pianist Ben Kim. Ray Chen was awarded the Grand Prize of the 2009 Queen Elisabeth International Violin Competition in Brussels. In addition to numerous prestigious concert engagements and a recording contract, Chen earned a three-year loan of the “Huggins” Stradivarius violin from the Nippon Music Foundation. He studies at the Curtis Institute of Music. David Coucheron was recently appointed concertmaster of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra. He won First Prize at the Concorso Internazionale di Musica Competition in 2009 in Turin, Italy. Coucheron, a graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music, Juilliard, and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, plays a 1725 Stradivarius. He has studied at the Bowdoin International Music Festival since 2006. Suyoen Kim, a native of Germany, was first prize winner at the 2006 Hannover International Violin Competition, and the 2003 International Violin Competition Leopold Mozart in Augsburg. She is a graduate student at the Academy of Music and Theater in Munich and plays a violin made in 1742 by Camillus Camilli. Ben Kim won First Prize in the 2006 Munich International Music Competition. Engagements at Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center have earned him critical acclaim, and recent orchestral engagements include performances with the Bavarian Radio, Central German Radio, Baltimore, Hermitage State, and Ulsan Symphony Orchestras. This year he will tour Japan with the Brno Philharmonic and make several debuts in Germany. At the Peabody Conservatory he is a candidate for the Artist Diploma, the school’s highest distinction. 2010 will mark his third summer at the Bowdoin Festival. FMI, contact Peter Simmons. |
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