2016 Montreal International Violin Competition Begins in Canada

May 22, 2016, 5:13 PM · Twenty-three violinists from around the world have arrived in Canada to begin competing Monday in the 2016 Montreal International Violin Competition.

If you'd like to watch the performances, click here for the Montreal violin competition livestream, which Violinist.com will carry all week on that page. Editor Laurie Niles also will be in Montreal from May 30 to June 3 to bring you live coverage of the Finals.

Candidates include violinists Laura Bortolotto (Italy); Elina Buksha (Latvia); Daniel Cho (United States); Clémence de Forceville (France); Anna Göckel (France); Ioana Cristina Goicea (Romania); Sirena Huang (United States); Petteri Iivonen (Finland); Gyehee Kim (South Korea); Bomsori Kim (South Korea); Woo Hyung Kim (South Korea); Anna Lee (South Korea); Christine Lim (South Korea/United States); Richard Lin (Taiwan/United States); Rika Masato (Japan); Diana Pasko (Russia); Fedor Rudin (France/Russia); Ji Won Song (South Korea); Elly Suh (United States/South Korea); Mai Suzuki (Japan); Ayana Tsuji (Japan); Xiao Wang (China); and Minami Yoshida (Japan). German candidate Albrecht Menzel withdrew at the last minute. You can find their bios and full programs on this page.

2016 Montreal violin competition candidates

Candidates in the 2016 Montreal International Violin Competition.

Twelve semi-finalists will be announced on May 25 after the last quarter-final session. From those, six finalists will be chosen to play in the Finals May 30 and 31. A Gala Concert will take place June 2, and for both the Finals and Gala Concert, competitors will perform with the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal (OSM), with guest conductor Giancarlo Guerrero.

In an interesting twist, prizes will be announced right before the Gala Concert. "Rather than reveal the results right after the Finals, the top three prizewinners, as well as the winners of all the special awards, will be announced at the awards ceremony preceding the gala concert on June 2. Both audiences, the one in the hall and the one following the competition on our webcast, will find out along with the competitors who has won and who will be performing with the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal right after the announcement of the results," said Christiane LeBlanc, director of the Montreal competition. "It promises to be an evening full of emotion!”

The compulsory Canadian work for the semi-finals is the first movement of the Sonate en sol for violin and piano by Canadian composer Jean Papineau-Couture (1916-2000), whose centenary is this year. The schedule and order of appearance can be found on this page. The finals and gala concert will also be webcast live and available on demand for three months on Medici.tv.

Jury members for the 2016 Montreal International Violin Competition include: Pierre Amoyal (France); Boris Brott (Canada); Boris Garlitsky (Russia -France); Ida Kavafian (Armenia - United States); Mihaela Martin (Romania); Vera Tsu Wei-Ling (China); and Kathleen Winkler (United States). André Bourbeau, Co-Founder and Chairman of the CMIM, will act as non-voting president of the jury.

Violinists are competing for a number of prizes, including a First Prize of C$30,000; Second Prize of C$15,000, Third Prize of C$10,000 as well as about a dozen other Special Prizes totaling C$27,500.

The Montreal International Musical Competition was founded in 2002 takes place every spring in a three-year rotation between voice, piano and violin. The last violin competition took place in 2013, when Belgian violinist Marc Bouchkov won the gold medal.

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2016 Montreal International Violin Competition Begins in Canada

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