2024: Simon Tetzlaff

Simon Tetzlaff learned his craft from some of the most distinguished cellists and teachers, and is now offering his passion for music making to a variety of audiences worldwide. He is the recipient of the Janos Starker Foundation Competition Award of 2024.

In recent years, Simon Tetzlaff performed as a soloist with the Orchestre Royal de Chambre de Wallonie, the ensemble “Frankfurter Solisten” and the Hamburg Camera- ta, giving his debut in the Hamburg Elbphilharmonie in 2020. As an avid chamber musician, he performed in various chamber music festivals, with musicians such as Rainer Schmidt, Guy Braunstein, Alina Ibragimova, Mikhail Pochekin, Benjamin Beilman and Christian Tetzlaff. In 2024, he gave his debut at the Rheingau Musikfestival.

Starting this year, he is working as Artistic Director of the Landshut Chamber Music Festival together with violinist Mikhail Pochekin.

Born in 1997 in Frankfurt, Germany, he received piano, music theory and cello lessons in his early childhood. As a pre-college student at the music academy in Frankfurt, Simon attracted attention in various youth competitions and was invited to masterclasses at the Kronberg Academy.

He was a student of Prof. Julian Steckel at the academy in Munich, Prof. Clemens Hagen at the Mozarteum Salzburg and recently completed the Artist Diploma Program at USC Thornton in Los Angeles, studying with Prof. Ralph Kirshbaum.

He collected other musical impulses with world-renowned cellists, such as Alban Gerhardt, Gustav Rivinius and Torleif Thedéen. In the course of his studies he held fellowships from the German Academic Scholarship Foundation, the Deutsche Stiftung Musikleben, Villa Musica Rheinland- Pfalz and PE-Förderungen Mannheim.

Since February 2020 he plays an instrument by Jean Baptiste Vuillaume, by courtesy of the Music Instrument Fonds of the Deutsche Stiftung Musikleben.

2020: Brannon Cho

Praised for his “burnished tone, spellbinding technique, and probing musical mind” (Boston Classical Review), cellist Brannon Cho has emerged as an outstanding artist of his generation. He is the First Prize winner of the prestigious 6th International Paulo Cello Competition, and is also a top prize winner of the Queen Elisabeth, Naumburg, and Cassadó International Cello Competitions.

Most recently, Brannon Cho is the recipient of the 2020 Janos Starker Foundation Award, the Landgraf von Hessen Prize from Kronberg Academy, the 2019 Ivan Galamian Award previously held by James Ehnes, and is a scholarship holder in the Anne-Sophie Mutter Foundation.

Brannon Cho has appeared as a soloist with many of the top orchestras around the world, including the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Belgian National Orchestra, Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra, and Brussels Philharmonic under world-renowned conductors such as Susanna Mälkki, Stéphane Denève, Christian Arming, and Hugh Wolff.

Brannon Cho’s recent and upcoming solo performance highlights include the Cello Biënnale Amsterdam, Armenian State Symphony Orchestra, Istanbul State Symphony Orchestra, Kumho Art Hall in Seoul, Rheingau Musik Festival with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Vancouver Chamber Music Society, and Seoul Arts Center. Recently, he replaced Alisa Weilerstein in Prokofiev’s Sinfonia Concertante with Belgian National Orchestra.

Born in New Jersey, Brannon Cho received his Bachelor’s degree from Northwestern University’s Bienen School of Music under Hans Jørgen Jensen. He was awarded the prestigious Artist Diploma from the New England Conservatory, where he studied with Laurence Lesser. Today, he is in the Professional Studies program at the Kronberg Academy, under the tutelage of Frans Helmerson.

Brannon Cho is sponsored by Thomastik-Infeld, and performs on a rare cello made by Antonio Casini in 1668 in Modena, Italy.

2018: Santiago Cañón-Valencia

Colombian cellist Santiago Cañón-Valencia is a prolific soloist, composer, commissioner, recording artist, painter and photographer described as "technically flawless... totally under the skin of the composers' idioms" (The Strad). A 2022 BBC Next Generation Artist, Cañón-Valencia was born in Bogotá in 1995 and made his orchestral debut as a soloist when he was six years old with the Orquesta Filarmónica de Bogotá.

After a summer of recitals in the U.K., Germany, Italy, Spain and Korea, Cañón-Valencia launches his 2024-2025 season with the Camerata Pacifica on a California tour with Paul Huang and Gilles Vonsattel. He performs as a featured soloist across Europe, including concerts with the Orchestra of Extremadura led by Juan Pablo Valencia in Spain and the Niederbayerische Philharmonic conducted by Ektoras Tartanis in Germany. In North America, he returns to the Phoenix Symphony with conductor Julian Rachlin and Symphony Nova Scotia with conductor Holly Mathieson in Halifax, Canada. He also makes his debut in a recital presented by The Phillips Collection with pianist Victor Asunción in Washington, D.C.

Cañón-Valencia’s 2023-2024 season highlights included his Wigmore Hall recital debut; broadcasts with the BBC Symphony Orchestra and Ulster Orchestra; debuts with the Danish Chamber Orchestra and Belgrade Philharmonic; returns to the Latvian National Orchestra, RTVE Orchestra, and Belgrade Philharmonic; U.S. recitals; returns to the Alabama Symphony and the Mostly Cello Festival in Korea; and performances in Colombia to celebrate his latest album Ascenso (2022, Sono Luminus) and perform with the National Symphony Orchestra. In the summer of 2024, he celebrated the 100th birthday of Janos Starker in Korea and Japan.

Among his many accolades, Cañón-Valencia won Silver Medal at the 2019 XVI International Tchaikovsky Competition; the 2018 Starker Foundation Award; Third Prize at the 2017 Queen Elisabeth International Competition; First Prize at the Carlos Prieto International Cello Competition, Beijing International Music Competition, Gisborne International Music Competition and Lennox International Young Artists Competition; and major prizes at the Sphinx, Casals, Johansen, Cassadó and Adam Competitions.

Cañón-Valencia's solo career has taken him around the world to perform with such orchestras as the Mariinsky Orchestra, Frankfurt Radio Orchestra, Brussels Philharmonic, SWR Symphonieorchester, Saint Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Antwerp Symphony, Moscow Soloists Chamber Orchestra and all of the major orchestras in Colombia.

Cañón-Valencia performed in the world premiere of Carlos Izcaray's cello concerto “Stringmaster” as soloist with the Alabama Symphony Orchestra, the Colombian premiere of Ginastera's Cello Concerto No. 2 with the National Symphony Orchestra of Colombia, the world premiere of Jorge Pinzón's Cello Concerto "Rapsodia a los 4 Elementos" at the Cartagena International Music Festival and Friedrich Gulda's Cello Concerto with the Auckland Chamber Orchestra.

As a recording artist, Cañón-Valencia enjoys immersing himself in known and unknown works, particularly in commissioning new pieces, arranging and composing. Recordings include his debut release Solo, an album with pianist Andrea Lucchesini dedicated to Schubert and Beethoven for the Egea Label, an album of Russian cello sonatas and popular pieces of the cello repertoire with pianist Katherine Austin for the Atoll label and his latest recording, Ascenso, released in November 2022 on Sono Luminus.

Cañón-Valencia has been sponsored by the Mayra & Edmundo Esquenazi Scholarship through the Salvi Foundation since 2011.

2016: Taeguk Mun

A recipient of the 2016 Janos Starker Award, laureate of the 2nd Queen Elisabeth Cello Competition and 16th International Tchaikovsky Competition, as well as the first prizewinner of Pablo Casals International Cello Competition and the 3rd Andre Navarra International Cello Competition, South Korean cellist Taeguk Mun enjoys an international career as a soloist, recitalist, chamber musician, and an educator.

As a soloist, Mr. Mun has appeared with various major orchestras worldwide including St. Petersburg Academic Philharmonia, Hungarian Radio Symphony, Orchestre national du Capitole de Toulouse, Suwon Philharmonic Orchestra, and Korean National Symphony Orchestra. Mr. Mun has been invited to the Classic Revolution Series at Lotte Concert Hall in Korea, Chamber Music International, Dallas, TX, Busan International Music Festival, Young Artist Concert Series at the Louvre Museum, Budapest Spring Festival, Seoul Spring Festival of Chamber Music, the World Orchestra Festival in Korea, and Eaktay AHN 110th Anniversary Concert in Hungary.

As a chamber music enthusiast, Mr. Mun has collaborated with esteemed musicians such as Paul Biss, Stella Chen, Catherine Cho, Jinjoo Cho, Kyung Wha Chung, Miriam Fried, Stefan Jackiw, Clara-Jumi Kang, Dong-Suk Kang, Bomsori Kim, Sunwook Kim, Ralph Kirshbaum, Dong-Hyek Lim, Mischa Maisky, Richard Yongjae O’Neill, HaeSun Paik, Christoph Poppen, Yekwon Sunwoo, and Inmo Yang.

Mr. Mun has studied as a full scholarship student at the University of Southern California with Marcy Rosen, Hannah Roberts, and Ralph Kirshbaum where he finished a Master of Music degree. He additionally holds a Bachelor of Music degree from New England Conservatory where he studied with Laurence Lesser. A native of South Korea, Mr. Mun moved to New York in 2007 and continued his training with Minhye Clara Kim at the Juilliard School Pre-College division as a full scholarship student. He is currently pursuing the Artist Diploma program at the Juilliard school with Joel Krosnick and Minhye Clara Kim.

Mr. Mun is sponsored by SungJung Cultural Foundation, Hwangjin Scholarship Committee and was selected as a “G.rium Artist” by SK Chemicals of Korea. He was appointed the artist-in-residence at the Kumho Art Hall in 2017 and Lotte Concert Hall in Korea in 2022.

Last Updated: December 2024