Monday 15 November 2021

CMF Artists 2021

City Music Foundations artists 2021 (Photo Benjamin Ealovega)
City Music Foundations artists 2021 (Photo Benjamin Ealovega)

The City Music Foundation (CMF) has recently announced the eleven successful artists and ensembles that form the 9th consecutive intake joining CMF's two year CMF Artist Programme. The 2021 CMF Artists are Connaught Brass, Ensemble Hesperi (baroque), Harriet Burns (soprano), Helena Kay (saxophone), James Larter (percussion), Joy Lisney (cello), Laura Perešivana (soprano), Olivia Boen (soprano), Sirius Chau (flute), Victor Lim (piano), and Yume Fujise (violin). They were chosen from a record-breaking number of applicants by judges including Sholto Kynoch, Howard Williams, Seb Scotney, Kit Downes, Leslie East, Mats Lidstrom, Louise Williams, Joan Rodgers, William Dazeley, Iain Burnside, Paul Edlin and William Fong. Thanks to CMF's recent partnership with Barts Heritage, live auditions were able to take place in Great Hall in the North Wing of St Bartholomew's Hospital in September 2021.

  • Connaught Brass made their debut at the Lucerne Festival and are already set to perform at London’s Wigmore Hall. They won 1st Prize in the inaugural Philip Jones International Brass Ensemble Competition 2019
  • In 2020, Ensemble Hesperi were selected as Britten Pears Young Artists, and in November 2020, won first prize at the LIFEM Young Ensemble Competition. The ensemble's debut disc, Full of the Highland Humours, has just come out on EM Records [see my review]
  • Soprano Harriet Burns is Samling Artist, Oxford Lieder Young Artist and a Britten-Pears Young Artist. We caught her on-line in a filmed recital with pianist Ian Tindale earlier this year [see my review]
  • Originally from Perth, Scotland, saxophonist Helena Kay moved to London in 2012 to study at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. Helena released her debut album Moon Palace in 2017 after winning the Peter Whittingham Jazz Award the same year
  • Percussionist James Larter graduated from the Royal Academy of Music and the Manhattan School of Music, winning awards from the ESU, New York Philharmonic and Yamaha Foundation, and he is an in-demand session musician 
  • Joy Lisney combines composition with a performing career as cellist and conductor. As a cellist, Joy has performed in the major European concert halls including the Wigmore Hall, Amsterdam Concertgebouw and Leipzig Gewandhaus as well as three consecutive sold-out recitals at London’s Southbank Centre
  • Latvian soprano Laura Lolita Perešivana was one of four finalists selected for the Guildhall School’s Gold Medal, as well as the recipient of the Musicians’ Company Award. We caught her in the Guildhall School's programme of new operas in May this year [see my review]
  • Soprano Olivia Boen was a finalist in the Guildhall Gold Medal Prize hosted by the Barbican, was a member of the Wigmore Hall French Song Exchange led by Dame Felicity Lott and François le Roux. We caught her in the Guildhall School's triple bill of Italian rarities [see my review
  • Hong-Kong-born flautist Sirius Chau is the winner of the Royal Over-Seas League Competition 2020, He received the Tagore Gold Medal from HRH The Prince of Wales and Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother Scholarship in 2019; and made his solo debuts at the Wigmore Hall and Bridgewater Hall in the same year
  • South Korean-British pianist Victor Lim made his first public appearance in the televised 2012 BBC Young Musician of the Year, and has performed around the world in the UK, France, Germany, Austria, Norway, Denmark, Romania, China, Singapore and South Korea. 
  • BBC Introducing Classical Artist Yume Fujise is a Japanese violinist currently living in London. She studied at the Royal College of Music and won the 2014 and 2018 Violin Competition, and 2015 Concerto Competition and 2017 Concerto Competition
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