Source: http://www.pianobridges.com/en/jury/
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 18:14:06+00:00

Document:
Grigory Korchmar was born in 1947 in Baltiysk, Kaliningrad region. He received his higher musical education in composition (with prof. V. N. Salmanov) and in piano (with prof. P. A. Serebryakov) at the St. Petersburg State Conservatory.
He has composed more than 160 works in different genres of theatre, symphonic, choir, vocal and instrumental chamber music, as well as works for children and youth, and made numerous transcriptions of other composers’ music for various performing groups. Mr. Korchmar has had recitals in St. Petersburg, Moscow and other important cultural centers of different countries (New York, Boston, Hartford, Berlin, Cologne, Tokyo, Jerusaleum).
The symphony and chamber works of the composer are often performed at significant festivals in Russia (St. Petersburg Music Spring, Stars of the White Nights, Moscow Autumn, Svyatoslav Richter’s December Nights), the USA, Europe (Belgium, Great Britain, Hungary, Germany, Spain, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Slovakia, Finland, France, Switzerland, Georgia, the Ukraine, Estonia) and Asia (Israel, Turkey, the Republic of Korea, Japan). His works have been repeatedly awarded prestigious prizes (the First Prize at the International Competition named after S. S. Prokofiev; the Prize of the St. Petersburg Government).
Grigory Korchmar has been performing for more than forty years. G. Korchmar is Professor of composition in St. Petersburg State Conservatory and Professor of the Department of Music Education at the Herzen State Pedagogical University. He is President of the St. Petersburg Composers’ Union and bears the title of the Honoured Art Worker of the Russian Federation.
Born in 1978 in Leningrad (now St. Petersburg), Oleg Vainstein began to study music at the age of 5. From 1993 to 1997, Mr. Vainstein studied in the St. Petersburg Rimsky-Korsakov College of Music under L. A. Vasilyeva who was a pupil of great Russian pianist Lev Oborin. In 1997 he entered the N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov Saint Petersburg State Conservatory. His professor was Tatyana Zagorovskaya, a prize-winner of international competitions. On completing his postgraduate education, Mr. Vainstein obtained a teaching position in the Piano Department of the conservatory. Now he combines teaching with giving concerts. His students have been awarded a number of prizes in different international competitions. In 2010, he was awarded the Hope of Russia government prize in the Best Teacher nomination.
Oleg Vainstein is a prize-winner of several international competitions. He has given concerts in France, Germany, Poland, Mexico, Austria and Russia. He has performed as soloist with the Academic Symphoni Orchestra of the St. Petersburg Filarmony (conductor Leo Kremer), the St. Petersburg State Conservatory Orchestra (conductor A. Sladkovskiy), the St. Petersburg State Symphony Orchestra (cond. V. Petrenko, O. Soldatov, N.Kornev), the Orchestra Classica (conductor A. Kantorov), the Far Eastern Symphony Orchestra (conductors V. Titz, I. Derbilov, E. Schloifer) and the Warsaw Conservatory Symphony Orchestra. He has taken part in the productions of the Mariinskiy Theatre as a solo pianist under the direction of V. Gergiev and M. Agrest. Mr. Vainstein devotes a lot of attention to chamber music. He has performed with singers Vasiliy Gerello, Irina Vasilyeva, Timur Abdikeev, Sergey Zykov, Vladimir Alexandrovich, cellists Dmitriy Khrychev and Alexey Vasilyev, the Atrium, Hermitage, and Taneyev Quartets, the Expromt Quintet, pianists Andrey Ivanovich and Stanislav Solovyev. Oleg Vainstein has participated in the St. Petersburg Music Spring Festival, Dedication to Maestro Festival, the Days of the German Culture Festival and others. He has also served as a juror for various international competitions.
He has made several recordings for various radio stations and CD labels. Pavel Eliashevich was filmed by the NHK-Japan TV for the documentary Culture of St. Petersburg that received the UNESCO Annual Award in New York (2000). Since 1993, Mr. Eliashevich has been Professor of Piano and Chamber Ensemble at the Herzen State Pedagogical University in St. Petersburg. He gives master classes as a guest professor in Denmark (the Royal Academy of Music, Copenhagen), Belgium (the Young Artists Performance Academy), and the USA (Baylor University , Waco, Texas). He has also served as a jury member for international competitions in Russia and Europe. Since 2004, Mr. Eliashevich has participated as a solo Pianist in Stravinsky’s Les Noces in the Mariinsky Theatre (cond. Valery Gergiev). In 2009, he gave one of the first US performances of the original version of Rachmaninoff’s Fourth Piano Concerto.
Organist Luc Ponet, born in Hasselt (Belgium), gives credit for his international reputation above all to his successful performances in many renowned organ festivals, such as in Paris, Warsaw, Tokyo, Mexico, Chicago, Las Pinas (Manilla), and in the Festival of Flanders. He received the Diplôme Superieur, the so-called “Prix d’excellence”, with great distinction (class of Prof. Chris Dubois) at the College of Music “Lemmensinstituut” in Leuven. Later, his artistic development was greatly influenced by further studies (in organ and improvisation) with Prof. Dr. Hans Haselböck at the Hochschule für Musik in Vienna. In 1982, Luc Ponet was appointed Professor for Organ at the Lemmensinstituut in Leuven and in 1996 he was a guest professor of organ at Concordia University in River Forest (Chicago, Ill.).
In 1988, he became Organist-Titular of the monumental Le Picard-organ in the Basilica in Tongeren (Belgium). In 1999 he became the “organist in residence” of Castel Alden Biesen, the European cultural centre of the Flemish Community in Rijkhoven-Bilzen (Belgium), where he plays on a fantastic Van Peteghem organ from 1788. Both locations are classified as World Heritage by the UNESCO. In september 2000, Mr. Ponet was appointed inspector for the art education in the state academies of music, music schools and conservatories, and in April 2012 he was appointed as the city organist of Leuven (Belgium).
Galina Minsker was born in St. Petersburg. She graduated from the St. Petersburg State Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatory where she studied under professors V. Razumovskaya (studied with H. Neuhaus) and M. Gambaryan ( studied with K. Igumnov). At present she is a Senior Teacher of the Piano Department at the St. Petersburg State University of Culture and Arts. At the same time, Galina Minsker works as a specialist of professional rehabilitation of pianists suffering from occupational diseases. Being the follower of A. Shmidt-Shklovskaya (a pianist, a teacher, and the author of an original method for treating professional diseases) she is one of the few specialists in this field in Russia.
Sergey Uryvaev was born in 1947 in St. Petersburg. He studied in the school attached to the St. Petersburg State Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatory at the piano department (under A. Zhukovskaya). Later he graduated from the St. Petersburg State Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatory where he studied with professors S. Savshinski, V. Nilsen, P. Serebryakov (piano), and M. Karandashova(chamber ensemble), and of which he is now a professor himself, teaching piano and piano ensemble. He gives regular solo recitals and master classes. He has performed in Russia and abroad with the Academic Symphony Orchestra, the Novosibirsk Symphony Orchestra and others, and with instrumentalists (all instruments except the flute-piccolo and the tuba). Mr. Uryvaev’s main activity is chamber music.
For many years he worked in the well-known Saint Petersburg Trio (S. Uryvaev, M. Safariants, L. Shukaev) which went on tours around Europe and America in the framework of the Eucational Bridge Project between St. Petersburg and Boston. Mr. Uryvaev serves as a jury member for international competitions in Russia. He bears the title of the Honored Artist of Russia, and is a member of the Concert Workers’ Union of the Russian Federation.
Graduated from the St. Petersburg Conservatoire (MA and DA) where she studied with Oleg Malov and Eduard Bazanov. Since 1992 she has been teaching at the Piano Department of the same conservatoire. In 1997 she was a prizewinner of the Gartow Stiftung Competition, and the first prize winner at the National Beethoven Competition. Besides a wide classical repertoire, Prof. Sandovskaya specialises in playing contemporary music. She has participated in many contemporary music festivals, such as “From Avant-garde to Today”, “Sound Waves”, “Art Genda” (Copenhagen), “Mozart and Modern” (Switzerland), “Simeon ten Holt” (Holland). She has released a number of CDs – with Beethoven’s “Hammerklavier”, compositions by Ustvolskaya, Korolev, Izosimov, I.Schlein. In South Korea she recorded 12 instructional videos of Beethoven’s sonatas.
Prof. Sandovskaya frequently performs in recitals and with orchestras.

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