Competition 2013
We are pleased to announce the winners of the Gianni Bergamo Classic Music Award – Competition for composition 2013.
Ranking 2013
- 1st prize: Jorge Gijón Sánchez
- 2nd prize: Warren Wai On Lee
- 3rd prize: not awarded
Winners 2013
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1st prize: Jorge Gijón Sánchez (Spain)
Jorge Gijón Sánchez was born in Granada (Spain) in 1982. In 2005 he obtained a degree in composition in Granada at the Conservatorio Superior Victoria Eugenia, under the guidance of Francisco González Pastor. In 2003 he graduated in Educational Science with a specialisation in music. He later earned a degree in History and science of music at the University of Granada.
He has taught composition since 2006: at present at the Maria de Molina Professional music conservatory in Úbeda (Jaén, Spain). This was confirmed in July 2010, by winning a public competition.
He currently studies conducting with Octav Caleya and Nicolás Pasquet, cello with Jose Antonio Salazar, and piano with José Luis Hidalgo.
Among his compositions are a Concerto for violin and orchestra “Don Juan-‐Mefistófeles” (2004), “Tempus fugit” (2006) for large orchestra and “Las Trompetas de Jericó” for brass instruments (2010). He has also elaborated works for chamber music, electroacoustic music, and made diverse arrangements.
He plays piano, cello and accordion in jazz and Latin music groups and similar Spanish stiles.
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2nd prize: Warren Wai On Lee (Hong Kong)
Graduated from the Royal Academy of Music and Yale School of Music with the highest of honors, Warren was the first-prize winner of the 1995 Stravinsky Awards International Piano Competition and the “Grand Prix Ivo Pogorelich”. Hailed by The Straits Times as a musician with “superb pianism… a wonderful sense of colour and impeccably controlled articulation”, Warren’s artistry has brought him to four continents, gracing stages of all sizes and forms, from the National Center for Performing Arts in Beijing to Kettering in Tasmania, and from New York to Colombo, Sri Lanka. 16
In 2009, he was named a “Steinway Artist”, joining a distinguished roster of concert pianists in the world; and in 2012, received the Ten Outstanding Young Persons Award in Hong Kong in recognition of his outstanding achievement in the performing arts and exemplary contribution to the community.
An avid composer and arranger of different genres, Warren’s choral compositions have been gaining recognition internationally, some of which published by Porfiri and Horváth (Germany) and Pavane Publishing (USA).
Warren devotes much of his time off the stage advancing various education initiatives. He is currently the Music Director of St. Paul’s Co-educational College and Primary School in Hong Kong, and is co-currently a guest professor at the Central Conservatory of Music, an adjunct faculty member of the Hong Kong Baptist University, the Hong Kong Representative of Royal Academy of Music, and a visiting artist in various universities and conservatories worldwide. His solo album, “From Bach To Gershwin”, released in 2008 on Universal Music (Hong Kong), has received critical acclaim for its contribution to music education. His second album, “Ebony and Ivory” for the Naxos label is due for release in December 2013.
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Mention of the jury: Łukasz Urbaniak (Poland)
He was born in Bydgoszcz, on the 16th of January 1980, a composer, a music theorist, a pianist and a teacher. In 2003 he graduated from Secondary Music School in Bydgoszcz, where he mastered his skills in Rafał Krokowski’s piano class. From 2003 to 2009 he studied composition in Feliks Nowowiejski Academy of Music in Bydgoszcz with Professor Marek Jasiński. He has also a master degree in Theory of Music. Both of the departments he finished with honours.
He is a graduate of law at the Departament of Law and Administration at Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń. He founded the Composition Competition for students from secondary music schools in memory of Professor Marian Gordiejuk, and a student artistic and scientific club at the Department of Composition, Theory of Music and Sound at the Academy of Music in Bydgoszcz. There he co-organised and took part in composers’ concerts and interdisciplinary scientific meetings (Con-Front-Akcje- concerts together with debates organized in the City Gallery of Bydgoszcz, 2006-2008). In 2008 he got the President’s of Bydgoszcz Scholarship for his artistic and management activity. In 2011 he created his own private music studio, in which he works as a teacher and manager. Łukasz Urbaniak in his artistic interests is concerned with sacrum which originates directly from the Judaic and Christian traditions.
He was awarded several prizes, i.e. I Prize in 1st National Choral Composers Competition For Passion Work, in Bydgoszcz, for De profundis for mixed choir a cappella, 2004; II Prize (I prize was not awarded) in the 15Th Adam Didur Open Composers Competition in Sanok for Three Songs for soprano and piano, with the lyrics of Kazimierz Przerwa-Tetmajer, 2007; II Prize in the 17
3rd National Choral Composers Competition for Passion Work in Bydgoszcz for Crucifixus for mixed choir a cappella, 2008; two main awards in National Composers Compositions For Choral Song A Cappella in Legnica for Gloria for female choir and Te Deum Laudamus for mixed choir, 2008; II Prize in the 5th International Composers Competition “Musica Sacra” in Częstochowa for Exaltabo te Domine for mixed choir a cappella, 2009; II Prize in the Composers Competition “Fides et Ratio” for his Laudate Dominum, for mixed choir a cappella, 2009; II Prize in the 7th International Composers Competition for Psalmus V, for mixed choir a cappella, 2011; I Prize in 2nd National Composers Competition For Liturgical Choral Work for In te Domine speravi, for mixed choir a cappella, 2011.
Łukasz Urbaniak’s compositions were performed in Poland and abroad, and recorded.
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Mention of the jury: Dale Trumbore (USA)
Hailed by the New York Times for her “soaring melodies and beguiling harmonies”, composer Dale Trumbore’s compositions have been performed widely in the United States and internationally by ensembles including the Kronos Quartet, ACME, and the USC Thornton Symphony.
Trumbore has received awards for her compositions from Chanticleer, Center City Opera Theater, the Harmonium Choral Society, Lyrica Chamber Music, the Society for Universal Sacred Music, and VocalEssence. She has received commissions from organizations including the American Choral Directors Association (ACDA), the Esoterics, the Millburn High School Symphony Orchestra & Miller Chorus, Six Degree Singers and WomenSing. Trumbore has also been awarded a Copland House Residency Award, the Artist in Residence Grant at the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation of New Mexico, and the American Composers Forum Subito grant. Trumbore’s dual interest in language and music leads her to collaborate frequently with contemporary poets, and Trumbore’s works for voice have been recorded by the New York Virtuoso Singers (Toward Lasting Peace), Six Degree Singers (Six Degrees of Composers), and soprano Gillian Hollis (Snow White Turns Sixty). Trumbore’s choral work The Whole Sea In Motion is published by G. Schirmer’s Dale Warland Choral Series.A New Jersey native and current resident of Los Angeles, Trumbore holds a Master of Music degree in Composition from the University of Southern California, where she studied with Donald Crockett and Morten Lauridsen, and a dual degree in Music Composition (B.M.) and English (B.A.) from the University of Maryland.
Trumbore’s music can be found at www.daletrumbore.com
The Jury of 2013
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Maestro Gianni Bergamo
Gianni Bergamo was born in Milan, Italy in 1941, attended primary school in Italy and Liceo in Switzerland. After a degree in Economy (1964) at the Catholic University of Milan, he dedicated himself to the study of music with Tissoni (harmony and composition), D. Maffeis (organ) and N. Sanzogno (orchestra conducting) at the Conservatory of Bergamo, Italy.
From 1964 to 1994 has been a businessman with his own import-export, real estate and finance companies, though at the same time he has remained close to music and to its world.
In 1990 he created the Cultural Association “Gli Amici Cantori”, first as a chorus alone, then later accompanied by an orchestra. He has given many concerts in Italy with them, preferring the symphonic-sacred repertoire (masses, oratories, passions, etc.). At present, he lives in Santiago del Chile. -
Bruno Zanolini
Born in Milan, Italy in 1945, he graduated with a diploma in Piano e Composition and also a degree in Letters. For many years he taught composition at the Conservatorio di Musica "G. Verdi" in Milan and was its director from 2007 to 2010.
Besides composing, he is also active as musicologist. In particular, he has thoroughly investigated counterpoint techniques in the Renaissance and Baroque periods, writing two treatises (La tecnica del contrappunto vocale nel Cinquecento, written in collaboration with R. Dionisi, and La tecnica del contrappunto strumentale nell’epoca di Bach) which are considered to be among the most important of the past decades.In addition to his original compositions, he has made many arrangements of folk melodies for choir particularly written for the Coro della SAT of Trento and for other similar performing groups.
He is president of the Artistic Commission of the USCI (Unione società corali italiane – Union of Italian Choral Societies) of the Lombard region of Italy.
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Enrico Miaroma
Enrico Miaroma was born in 1962 and graduated in Piano with full marks and honours, in Choral Music and Choral Conducting, in Music Didactics with full marks and in Music Composition.
He has won several prizes at national and international competitions, both as pianist, composer and choir conductor.He is active as a pianist and as a choral director he has held more than 600 concerts in Italy, Austria, Switzerland, Germany, Spain, Ukraine, United Kingdom, Taiwan Republic of China.
Several of his compositions for children's choir, for male, female and mixed choirs are published by Sulasol (Helsinki), Edizioni Carrara (Bergamo), A Coeur Joie (Lyon), Pro Musica Studium (Roma), Edizioni Federazione Cori del Trentino (Trento), Edizioni Musicali Europee (Milano), Choraliter (Feniarco), Tourdion (Aosta).
He is the Artistic Director of the national and international choral competition for children’s choirs “Il Garda in Coro” in Malcesine (Verona). He was Board Advisor of IFCM 2009-2011 and belongs to the Artistic Committee of ASAC (Veneto Choirs Association). Formerly professor in Choral Conducting at the Conservatories of Pescara and Adria, at present he is professor at the Conservatory of Trento.
He is member of the Artistic Committee of the Choral Trentino Federation. -
Gianluca Capuano
Gianluca Capuano was born in Milan in 1968 and belongs to the new generation of Italian early music interpreters that are able to merge classical music studies and deep humanistic knowledge. After receiving his diploma in organ, composition and orchestra conducting at the Giuseppe Verdi Conservatory in Milan, he attended advanced courses in choir conducting, performance practice, notation and research in the field of early music. He is presently organist at the Basilica di San Simpliciano, Milan (Ahrend organ, one of the most important in Italy).
Gianluca Capuano pursues an intense concert activity as organist and continuo specialist, collaborating with important soloists and ensembles; he has performed as soloist and conductor throughout Europe, the United States, Russia and Japan, in collaboration with artists such Monica Hugget, Michael Chance, Emma Kirkby. He conducts the professional vocal ensemble Il canto di Orfeo, founded in 2005, which appeared in numerous important festivals. He has achieved critical acclaim throughout Italy particularly for his vibrant interpretations of the Seventeenth-Century Roman Oratorio. He is considered a point of reference for the interpretation of the music of Giacomo Carissimi. Gianluca Capuano took his degree in theoretical philosophy, and devotes part of his time to research, in particular, concerning the problems of musical aesthetics.
He has published essays and articles on this subject. He collaborates as a musicologist with the Spanish/English magazine Goldberg. In 2002, his book, "I Segni della Voce Infinita", devoted to philosophical research on the origin of musical writing, was published by the important Italian firm Jaca Book. 2006 marked the appearance of the group's first CD, in collaboration with the mezzo-soprano Catherine King featuring arias of Galuppi by the English label Avie, which has been highly praised by the international critics and was Gramophon's editor's choice in January, 2007.
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Ivo Antognini
Born in Locarno, Switzerland, in 1963 Ivo Antognini obtains his degree in piano in 1985 at Lucerne, studying with Nora Doallo. His diploma in piano is followed by studies at the Swiss Jazz School in Berne with pianist Joe Haider.
Composition has been of great interest to him since childhood, so he is all the while dedicated to the activity as a self-taught composer.From 1989 to the present day he has composed a multitude of music for television and film.
Ivo Antognini has released three Jazz albums with his original works: The Dark Cloud (1993), Inspiration (1998), and Feggàri mou (2005). An informal, but very important, meeting with the Coro Calicantus and its director, Mario Fontana, led him to discover the field of choral music in 2006. He immediately became composer-in-residence of this splendid, world-class children's choir.He presented a series of his compositions at the 8th World Symposium on Choral Music with the Calicantus Choir in July, 2008 in Copenhagen, and obtained extraordinary public and critical success. In 2008 he also was awarded two first prizes in Swiss national choral composition competitions: SKJF-09 and Label Suisse.
Ivo Antognini's choral works have won prizes and mentions at international competitions, such as the
International Competition of Choral Composition "Seghizzi" 2009, 2010 and 2012, the 2010 and 2011 Simon Carrington Chamber Singers Composition Competition, the Vanguard Premieres Choral Composition Contest 2010, the 37th International Composition Contest "Guido d'Arezzo", the 2011 Choral Arts Ensemble Commissioning Contest, the Contemporary Americana Festival 2012 - Boston and the 2012 Freudig Singers Choral Composition Competition.He has been appointed Featured Composer of the Schola Cantorum on Hudson for the 2011-2012 concert season.
He has been invited by the American Choral Directors Association to present his choral music during the World Choir Games in Cincinnati (July 2012) where he was also one of the adjudicators of the competition.
Starting from 2009, his music has been performed worldwide by top level choirs such us Trinity College Choir of Cambridge, Trinity Wall Street Choir, Artists’ Vocal Ensemble, Vancouver Chamber Choir, Santa Fe Desert Chorale, Cappella Nova, Antioch Chamber Ensemble, St. Lawrence Choir, Kölner Kantorei, Lund University Male Choir, de Angelis Vocal Ensemble, Salt Lake Vocal Artists, Milwaukee Choral Artists, Swiss Youth Choir, Elektra Women’s Choir, Oriana Women’s Choir and many others.
Since 1987 he is Professor of Ear-training and of complementary Piano in the professional training level of the Conservatorio della Svizzera Italiana in Lugano. His choral works are published by Alliance Music Pub., Porfiri & Horváth, de Haske / Hal Leonard, Annie Bank Edition, Ferrimontana and others.