Gustav Mahler International Conducting Competition 2007

Announcement of the Prize-Winners

Today, Friday 27 April 2007, the Jury of the Bamberg Symphony Gustav Mahler Conducting Competition 2007 publicly announced the competition winners:

• 1st Prize                       (not awarded)
• 2nd Prize (€ 10,000 -)   Shi-Yeon Sung, South Korea
• 3rd Prize  (€ 5,000 - )    Benjamin Shwartz, USA
• 4th Prize  (€ 5,000 - )    Ewa Strusinska, Poland

Special Encouragement Award:  Yoel Gamzou, USA

On Saturday 28 April, Shi-Yeon Sung will conduct the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra - Bayerische Staatsphilharmonie, in a final public concert. The concert will begin at 7pm with the official prize giving by the President of the Jury - Principal Conductor, Jonathan Nott -  and the Competition’s Patron, Marina Mahler – grand-daughter to the composer Gustav Mahler.

The concert programme will be as follows:

Gustav Mahler: two songs from the song cycle  „Des Knaben Wunderhorn“: „Verlorne Müh’“ and  „Wo die schönen Trompeten blasen“

Bruno Mantovani: „Time stretch (on Gesualdo)“

          - intermission  -

Gustav Mahler: Symphony Nr. 1 in D major

Shi-Yeon Sung was born in 1975 in Pusan and studied piano first in Zurich and then at the Berlin “Universität der Künste”. In 2001 she took up conducting studies with Rolf Reuter at the "Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler“ in Berlin.  Since 2006 she has studied with Jorma Panula. Shi-Yeon gave her debut in Berlin in 2002 conducting Mozart’s “Magic Flute”. She has additionally assisted at the Görlitz Theatre and Hans Otto Theatre in Postdam. From 2003 – 2006 she directed the Cappella Academica at Berlin’s Humboldt University.  In 2004 she won the conducting forum of the Deutschen Musikrates as well as the Female Conductors Compeition in Solingen.  She went on to win the 2006 Frankfurt Sir Georg Solti International Conducting Competition. Shi-Yeon Sung has worked with orchestras such as the Berlin and Gävle Symphony Orchestras. From October 2007 she will work as assistant conductor to James Levine at the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

The second International Gustav Mahler Conducting Competition took place from 23 – 28 April.  From a total of 223 applications from 40 countries, 14 candidates were singled out and invited to participate; 3 of these candidates were women.  Each participant had the chance to work intensively with the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra in three rounds of rehearsals, before a Jury of internationally reputed conductors, composers and managers.

The Jury comprised:

• Marina Mahler, Honorary Member of the Jury
• Jonathan Nott, President of the Jury, Principal Conductor, Bamberg Symphony Orchestra - Bayerische Staatsphilharmonie
• Herbert Blomstedt, Honorary Life Conductor, Bamberg Symphony Orchestra
• Hans Graf, Principle Conductor, Houston Symphony Orchestra
• Mark-Anthony Turnage, Composer
• Paul Müller, Director, Bamberg Symphony Orchestra
• Rolf Beck, Head of NDR Orchestras and Choir, Hamburg, and Director, Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival.
• Serge Dorny, General Director,  L’Opéra National de Lyon
• Ernest Fleischmann, Consultant, Former Managing Director of the Los Angeles Symphony Orchestra
• Peter Pastreich, Consultant, Former Managing Director of the San Francisco Symphony
• Christian Dibbern, Member of the Board of the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra

By initiating and promoting the Bamberg Symphony Gustav Mahler Conducting Competition the orchestra and its management hope to offer a focus and drive which is important to the future development of music and young performers alike. 

The first competition, which took place in 2004, was won by Gustavo Dudamel. Aged just 23 at the time of winning, it was the first occasion that the young Venzuelan stood in front of a professional orchestra. The discovery of Gustavo Dudamel has since made news headlines and his success in the intervening years has been unparalleled. In addition to his regular guest appearances with the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra, Dudamel will take up the role of Principal Conductor of the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra at the start of the 2007 / 08 season and, recently announced, shall succeed Esa Pekka Salonen as Music Director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic commencing with the 2009 / 10 season. Still just 26 years old Gustavo Dudamel has a recording contract with Deutsche Grammophon and has released a CD of Beethoven with the Venezuelan Youth Orchestra.

The competition was supported by a generous donation from the Friends of the Bamberger Symphoniker and the company Brose Fahrzeugteile GmbH & Co. KG in Hallstadt. In addition the orchestra wish to thank the Oberfrankenstiftung for their engagement and support of the prize winners as well as the Ernst von Siemens Musikstiftung for their support in commissioning new compositions.

For more photos of the competition please click here.