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Soprano Meigui Zhang was named Laureate of the 2019 Prix Yves Paternot (the Verbier Festival Academy’s highest honour), was a finalist in the 2019 Queen Sonja International Music Competition, and took second place at the 2020 Opera Index Competition. She also won the Audience Prize at the 2020 Glyndebourne Opera Cup. While in the Metropolitan Opera’s Lindemann Young Artist Development Program, Zhang made her Metropolitan Opera debut as the Bloody Child in Macbeth, followed by Barbarina in The Marriage of Figaro. While attending the Merola Opera Program, she performed as Anne Trulove in The Rake’s Progress, and at both the Chautauqua Institute and at the Verbier Festival, she was seen as Pamina in The Magic Flute. Meigui Zhang earned her master’s degree from the Mannes School of Music, where she was a recipient of the George and Elizabeth Award, and completed her bachelor’s degree at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music.
Having graduated from the CNSMD (National Conservatory of Music and Dance) of Paris with a specialization in harp, chamber music, and interpretation of early vocal music, Sandrine Piau’s talent was first recognized by William Christie, who introduced her to the public. Today, she boasts an extensive repertoire and holds an exceptional position in the world of opera and song. She has appeared on stages of prestigious venues worldwide, including the Paris Opera, the Salzburg Festival, the Théâtre de la Monnaie in Brussels, the Muziektheater in Amsterdam, the Bayerische Staatsoper in Munich, Covent Garden in London, the Théâtres des Champs-Élysées, the Aix-en-Provence Festival, and the Monte-Carlo Opera. Additionally, she has given memorable performances in renowned cities such as New York, Paris, London, Tokyo, Munich, Zurich, Salzburg, and Hamburg, notably for the inauguration of the Elbphilharmonie. She has collaborated with esteemed conductors and has given recitals alongside esteemed pianists including Alexandre Tharaud, Christian Ivaldi, Jos van Immerseel, Susan Manoff, Eric le Sage, and David Kadouch. Furthermore, she has collaborated with ensembles including Ensemble Resonanz, Ensemble Contraste, Ensemble Pulcinella, and Quatuor Psophos, among others. Piau has dedicated several albums to the works of Haendel and Mozart, and has released numerous recital albums, all of which have received esteemed recognition including Editor’s Choice from Gramophone, Diapason d’Or, Choc Classica, and the Golden Key ResMusica. At present, she exclusively records for the Alpha Classics label. In 2021, she released the album Voyage Intime, which marked the beginning of an exciting collaboration with pianist David Kadouch. Looking ahead to 2023/24, her projects include live performances and a recording of Lully’s opera Atys, a performance of Così fan tutte in Munich, and the world premiere of Marc André Dalbavie’s opera La mélancolie de la résistance at the Staatsoper Unter den Linden in Berlin. In recognition of her contributions and accomplishments, Sandrine Piau was appointed as a Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters in 2006, and was honoured as Lyric Artist of the Year at the Victoires de la Musique in 2009.
Maki Namekawa is a leading figure among today’s pianists, bringing to audiences’ attention contemporary music by international composers. As a soloist and a chamber musician equally at home in classical and repertoire of our time, she performs regularly at international venues such as Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center New York, Musikverein Vienna, Barbican Center and Cadogan Hall London, Citè de la musique Paris, Philharmonie de Paris, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, BOZAR Bruxelles, Suntory Hall and Sumida Toriphony Hall Tokyo, Salzburg Festival, Ars Electronica Festival, Musik-Biennale Berlin, Rheingau Musik Festival and Piano-Festival Ruhr.
Maki Namekawa records and performs frequently for major radio networks in Austria, Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland, France and USA. Orchestra engagements include Royal Concertgebouw Orkest Amsterdam, Münchner Philharmoniker, Bamberger Symphoniker, Dresdner Philharmonie, Bruckner Orchester Linz, Sinfonieorchester Basel, Filharmonie Brno, American Composers Orchestra, and Seattle Symphony.
In 2013, she performed the world premiere of the entire cycle of Philip Glass’ 20 etudes for piano solo at Perth International Arts Festival under the participation of Glass himself, followed by concerts around the world in the US, Mexico, Brazil, Ireland, Scotland, Iceland, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Slovakia, Poland, Germany and Japan. A double-CD of the complete Glass etudes has been released in 2014 by Orange Mountain Music, reaching number 1 of the iTunes Classic charts and receiving high praise in the categories “Performance” and “Recording” by BBC Music Magazine. In September 2017 Maki Namekawa presented the whole cycle of Glass etudes for the first time in Austria at the Ars Electronica Festival as a project „Pianographique“ with real time visualization by Cori O‘Lan.
In September 2018, Maki Namekawa released the piano version of Philip Glass’ soundtrack “MISHIMA – A Life in Four Chapters” that depicts the life and death of the japanese writer and political activist Yukio Mishima. The arrangement was especially crafted for her by Glass’ longterm musical director Michael Riesman and features her crystal-clear technique. The recording was awarded the prestigious “Pasticcio Prize” by ORF – Austrian National Radio Broadcast. In June 2019, her another recording Isang Yun | Sunrise Falling was awarded Pasticcio Prize again.
In 2019 Philip Glass composed his first Piano Sonata especially for Maki Namekawa. She premiered the Sonata on July 4th, 2019 at Piano-Festival Ruhr in Germany in the presence of the composer. This Piano Sonata was commissioned by the Piano-Festival Ruhr, the Philharmonie de Paris and the Ars Electronica Festival.
Together with her husband, the conductor Dennis Russell Davies, Maki Namekawa formed a piano duo in 2003 which regularly performs in leading venues in Europe and North America including the Piano Festival Ruhr, the Radialsystem in Berlin, the Salzburg Festival, the Ars Electronica Festival, the Lincoln Center Festival, the Morgan Library and “Roulette” in New York City, the Philips Collection in Washington, D.C., and the Other Minds Festival in California. Major works written for the Namekawa-Davies Duo include Philip Glass’ “Four Movements for Two Pianos”, “Chen Yi’s “China West Suite”, and Glass’ “Two Movements for Four Pianos“ (with Katia and Marielle Labèque) all commissioned by the Piano Festival Ruhr. In July 2017, Maki Namekawa, Dennis Russell Davies and Philip Glass received the Piano Festival Ruhr Award. In 2019 japanese composer Joe Hisaishi composed for the Namekawa-Davies Duo a work for 2 pianos and chamber orchestra “Variation 57”, premiered in Tokyo under the baton of the composer.
Maki Namekawa studied piano at Kunitachi Conservatory in Tokyo with Mikio Ikezawa and Henriette Puig-Roget. In 1994 she won the Leonid Kreutzer Prize. In 1995 she continued her studies with Werner Genuit and Kaya Han at Musikhochschule Karlsruhe, where she completed her diploma as a soloist with special distinction. She went on to perfect her artistry in Classical-Romantic repertoire with Edith Picht-Axenfeld, in contemporary music with Pierre-Laurent Aimard at Musikhochschule Köln, György Kurtág, Stefan Litwin and Florent Boffard.
With roots and upbringing spanning Yemen, Israel and the United States, Achinoam Nini aka Noa, is a singer, songwriter, poet, composer, percussionist, speaker, activist and mother of three children.
Together with her longstanding musical collaborator Gil Dor, accomplished musician and co-founder of the Rimon School of music, Noa has released 15 international albums and graced many of the world’s most important and prestigious stages like Carnegie Hall and the White House and has performed for three Popes. She has been mentored by Pat Metheny and Quincy Jones and shared the stage with legends such as Stevie Wonder, Andrea Bocelli and Sting.
In addition to her prolific musical activity, Noa is considered Israel’s most prominent cultural advocate of dialogue and co-existence, her “Voice of Peace”.
Among her many awards is Commander of Order of Merit of the Italian Republic, one of Italy’s highest honors, Pilgrim of Peace from The Franciscan order in Assisi (awarded in the past to Bill Gates and Mother Theresa), and the Christal Award from the World Economic Forum. Noa is Israel’s first ambassador to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and is active as board-member and public advocate of a score of Human Rights and Peace organizations in Israel and abroad.
Mezzo-soprano Kitty Whately has been highly visible in Britain since being designated a BBC New Generation Artist from 2013 to 2015. Unusually versatile, she has performed opera, choral music, and lieder, and her repertory ranges from Gilbert and Sullivan to contemporary works.
Born Catherine Whately in London in 1983, she was the daughter of actor Kevin Whately. She appeared on television as the daughter of his onscreen character in the series Auf Wiedersehen. Whately was raised partly in northern England and attended Chetham’s School of Music in Manchester. There, she appeared as Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz. She went on to the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London and then the Royal College of Music International School. After winning several significant prizes, she was admitted to the Verbier Festival Academy, appearing there as Cherubino in Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro. These successes led to her designation as a BBC New Generation Artist in 2013 and to the chance to record her debut album, the song recital This Other Eden, on the Champs Hill label.
Since then, Whately has been a familiar figure on operatic stages, and not only in Britain. She appeared as Isabelle in Bernard Herrmann’s Wuthering Heights at L’Opéra National de Lorraine in France. At the Royal Opera House in London, she appeared as Mother/Other Mother in the world premiere of Mark-Anthony Turnage’s opera Coraline, and she has been noted for championing contemporary works. At the Three Choirs Festival, she was heard in a new work by Sally Beamish, and she commissioned a song cycle from composer Jonathan Dove. Whately has made several more recordings on Champs Hill, and in 2019, she joined baritone Roderick Williams on The Song of Love, a collection of little-known material by Ralph Vaughan Williams. She remained active through the COVID-19 pandemic, appearing on the 2021 Chandos release The Harmonious Echo: Songs of Sir Arthur Sullivan and on Signum Classics’ The Complete Songs of Fauré, Vol. 4. In 2023, she issued the solo recital Befreit: A Soul Surrendered on Chandos. Whately is the co-founder of the charity SWAP’ra (Supporting Women and Parents in Opera).
Biography by James Manheim