1st INTERNATIONAL YOUNG ARTISTS COMPETITION: FINAL ROUND

The goal of this competition is to give the opportunity to a young musician or a chamber ensemble to be featured in a concert programme during the 10th edition of the International Kalamata Music Days. The competition winner will also be granted a financial reward of 800,00 €. The competition is open to piano, violin, viola, cello, voice and chamber music entries and is consisting of two rounds. The preliminary round has already been carried out through the submission of videos. After evaluating this material, five candidates were chosen and invited to perform in front of a jury in the final round.

PROGRAMME:

Elie Hackel — violin solo, Apostolia Anastasiou, Maria Papapetropoulou — piano accompanists

César Franck (1822–1890): Sonata for piano and violin (1886)

II. Allegro

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791): Violin Concerto No.5 in A major, K.219 (1775)

I. Allegro aperto

Maryam Jalalikandy & Pavlos Mastrogiannis — lied duo

Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873–1943): Ne poy, krasavitsa, pri mne (Oh, do not sing, my beauty), Op.4, No. 4 (1890–93)

Arian Ahmadnejad (*2003): Pache Leyli (Persian traditional song) (2024)

Felix Mendelssohn (1809–1847): Wanderlied, Op. 57, No. 6 (1841)

Maurice Ravel (1875–1937): Chanson de la Mariée (Song of the Bride) from 5 Mélodies populaires grecques, M.A 4-5, 9-11 (1904–6) (version with Greek text)

Clara Schumann (1819–1896): Loreley, WoO 19 (1843)

Richard Strauss (1864–1949): Morgen! (Tomorrow!), Op. 27, No. 4 (1894)

Noah Lee — violoncello solo, Apostolia Anastasiou — piano accompanist

Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1827): Sonata for violoncello and piano No.4, Op.102, No.1 (1815)

II. Adagio – Allegro vivace

Sergey Prokofiev (1891–1953): Sonata for violoncello and piano, Op.119 (1949)

I. Andante grave

THE JURY:

Felix Froschhammer — violin

Vashti Hunter — violoncello

Dimitris Platanias — baritone

Elie Hackel was admitted to the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Paris in 2017, where he earned his Master’s degree in the class of Svetlin Roussev. He is currently pursuing a Master of Concert at the Haute École de Musique de Lausanne under the guidance of Svetlana Makarova and Pavel Vernikov. Throughout his career, Elie has taken part in numerous academies across Europe, studying with distinguished musicians such as Renaud Capuçon, Pavel Vernikov, Shmuel Ashkenasi, Mihaela Martin, and the Modigliani and Ebène Quartets. He is a laureate of several prestigious competitions and foundations, including the Ion Voicu International Competition, the Académie Philippe Jaroussky, the Seiji Ozawa Academy, and the Fondation Safran. Elie has performed live on French radio (Générations France Musique) and on Radio Télévision Suisse Espace 2. In 2025, he will release his first solo album, Transylvania, with the French label Aparté Music.

Maryam Jalalikandy, born in Tehran, began her musical journey studying Kamancheh and voice before dedicating herself fully to singing. At 16, she started vocal training with Hasmik Karapetian and later with Sheida Damghani. Since 2021, she has studied with Professor Marion Eckstein at the State University of Music and Performing Arts Stuttgart. In 2023, Maryam won third prize at the International Mikuláš Schneider-Trnavský Singing Competition in Slovakia. A scholarship holder of Live Music Now since 2024, she will also take part in the opera workshop with Thomas Hampson and Melanie Diener in Waiblingen. She has attended masterclasses with Christiane Iven, Ulrike Sonntag, Thilo Dahlmann, Evelyn Schörkhuber, Rannveig Braga-Postl, Götz Payer, Thomas Seyboldt, and Anna Maria Pammer. Despite restrictions in Iran, she performed actively as a soloist and chorister in Tehran. Today, she continues to establish herself primarily as a soloist in Germany.

Pavlos Mastrogiannis was born in Athens and began studying piano at the age of 12. In 2021, he completed his studies at the National Conservatory of Athens under Christiana Platania, graduating with the highest distinction and receiving second prize. He is currently pursuing a Bachelor’s degree in Historical Keyboard Instruments at the State University of Music and Performing Arts Stuttgart, where he studies fortepiano with Professor Dr. Stefania Neonato, as well as harpsichord and basso continuo with Arianna Radaelli. For the past three years, he has been performing as the pianist of a lied duo with Maryam Jalalikandy and serves as the harpsichordist of the ensemble Aris Sonora. He has also participated in numerous masterclasses in the field of early music, further enriching his expertise in historical performance practice.

Noah Lee gained international recognition at age 12, winning 1st Prize at the 7th International Tchaikovsky Competition for Young Musicians in Montreux, becoming the first American cellist to receive this honour. Two years later, he won the Grand Prize at the 10th International Cello Competition “Antonio Janigro” in Croatia, also receiving the Zagreb Management and Zagreb Soloists Awards, which led to his European recital debut and performances with the Zagreb Soloists. He has since appeared as a soloist with the Bravura Philharmonic, Ensemble 212, Lausanne Sinfonietta, Russian State Orchestra, and Princeton Symphony Orchestra, and in 2019 performed the Dvořák Cello Concerto with the Seongnam Philharmonic under Maestro Kum Nanse. Noah is currently pursuing a Master of Performance at the Musik-Akademie Basel with Danjulo Ishizaka. He holds an A.B. in Economics from Harvard and an M.M. from the New England Conservatory. His past mentors include Laurence Lesser, Richard Aaron, Soo Youn Lee, Hans Jensen, and Jens Peter Maintz.