A violinist of dazzling technique and rare sensibility, Sung-Ju Lee has captivated audiences around the world with her "imaginative playing and luminous sound", her "impeccable technique", and her "taste for the dramatic and unflagging sense of authority".

This acclaimed violinist launched her career with a New York debut in 1977 as a winner of "Young Concerts Artists" and was immediately recognized as "a first-rate violinist" by the New York Times.

Designated by Musical America Magazine as one of the country's most outstanding young artists, she has a long list of prizes, starting as a top prize winner of Ewha Young People's Competition in Korea at age 11.  She has gone on to win 1st prize in the Wieniawski-Kosciuszko Violin Competition in New York, a top prize in the Sibelius competition in Finland, a special citation as a finalist in the Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow and a Laureate diploma from Queen Elisabeth Com­petition in Belgium.

"When Sung-Ju Lee plays, the impact is immediate", noted the Los Angeles Times.  "She is exciting and powerful."

"Miss Lee has a tone of pure gold", said the Oklahoma City Journal Record.

Upon graduation from the Julliard School (where she studied with Ivan Galamian, Margaret Pardee, and Dorothy Delay), she was awarded the First Kreisler Fellowship for graduate studies.  Her list of accomplishments is impressive, beginning with her appearance as a soloist with the Seoul Philharmonic at the age of 9.

Read Sung-Ju Lee's complete biography on her Love2Arts page

After his brilliant graduation in double bass at the "G. Rossini Conservatory" in Pesaro, under the guidance of Maestro Scala, Giovanni Lucchi joined a jazz group - the lively "Adriatic Riviera".  In the juvenile energy of his twenties, Maestro Lucchi moved to Sweden and spent a "Bohemian" life earning his money playing in ballrooms and night clubs.

A professional place in an orchestra is, especially nowadays, considered to be a lovely mirage, a mystical vision, so that to finally reach it was like having happiness and security in one's hands.  But Giovanni was not happy, and even though he had achieved the position he wanted, he was not satisfied.

The opportunity to give vent to his restlessness came in the form of a requirement.  As many string musicians, Maestro Lucchi is compelled to change his bow hair regularly and, when he inquired about a bow repairer, everyone laughed saying, "There is only a bike repairer in Ravenna, able to change bow hairs".  After this reply, he said to himself, "I would not be any worse than a bike repairer".  In this bizarre way, Giovanni Lucchi has become one the greatest bow rehairers and, in fact, bow makers of all times.

Read more on his web site

Vegard Nilsen studied with prof. Arve Tellefsen at the Norwegian State Academy of Music and with Viktor Liberman and Lex Korff de Gidts at the Utrecht Conservatory where he graduated cum laude.  During his student years he attended masterclasses with Hristo Donkin, Vladimir Mendelssohn, Franco Gulli, Gyorgy Pauk, Instvan Parkanyi, Herman Krebbers and the Altenberg Trio Wien.  He was leader of the second violins of the Netherlands Chamber Orchestra, and since 1995 he is a professor of violin at the Royal Flemish Conservatory of Music in Antwerp.

Being an accomplished pedagogue he gave master classes in Norway, Belgium, The Netherlands and Germany.  A passionate chamber musician he has built up an international reputation als violinist of The Atlantic Trio.  His work as organizer of Gjøvik Chamber Music Festival and his own concert series in Amsterdam have been widely recognized.  He has played chamber music with Gil Sharon, Phillippe Entremont and with members of the famous Orlando Quartet.  Vegard Nilsen is also the founder of the company "Music and Business".  He plays a violin by Jean-Baptiste Vuillaume.

Praised by the legendary Martha Argerich as "one of the best young musicians I ever heard in my life", the Italian pianist Irene Russo (1974) appeared on the big international stages like one of the most interesting talents of her generation.

In July 2008 she was the recipient of the First Prize at the Dorothy MacKenzie International Piano Award in New York.  This prestigious prize includes engagements in Berlin, Hamburg, Düsseldorf and debut at Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center in 09/10.

Early this season 07/08 she performed in all most prestigious concert venues in Germany: a coming-back tour with Klassische Philharmonie Orchester (Brahms #2) and Heribert Beissel culminated in a fully-packed Berlin Konzerthaus, where she received great acclaim from public and press.  Recently she made her debut in Stuttgart Liederhalle and in April 2008 she was invited to perform in Barcelona at Auditorium Marshall.

In 2000 Irene Russo won the Clara Schumann International Piano Competition in Düsseldorf, where she was particularly praised by the Jury: Joachim Kaiser ("She reminds me of a young Kempff"), Nelson Freire, Maria Tipo and Martha Argerich ("Mademoiselle Russo à toute mon admiration") among others.  Ms. Russo is also Prize Winner of the 2002 ARD International Piano Competition in Munich, where she received the Special Prize for the Best Interpretation of the Contemporary Music.  Living composers, among which Jörg Widmann, have written works especially for her.  In 2003, Irene Russo was awarded with a Mention of Honour at the Martha Argerich International Piano Competition.

Read more on her web site (only viewable in Internet Explorer)

Gian Paolo Luppi was born on 9th March, 1959 in San Giovanni in Persiceto, near Bologna.  After classical studies he graduated in Piano, Choral Music, Instrumentation for wind ensemble, Composition and Conducting.  His teachers were B.M. Furgeri, B. Bettinelli, F. Donatoni and A. Solbiati for Composition and T. Gotti, G. Bellini and P. Olmi for Conducting.  During his studies he also attended courses at the Accademia Musicale Chigiana in Siena, the Accademia Filarmonica in Bologna and the Accademia St. Cecilia in Roma.

Since 1984 he has been awarded many prizes in Composition Competitions: 1984, "Città di Belveglio"; 1985, "Città di Castagneto Carducci" (Peters-edition prize in Italy); 1986, "B. Brecht prize" in Milano and "Città di Belveglio"; 1987, "Biennale87" of Barcellona; 1988, "Viotti-Valsesia" prize in Vercelli and "G. Briccialdi" prize in Terni; 1989, "E. Porrino" prize of Cagliari; 1990, "V. Bucchi" prize in Roma and "E. Toldrà" prize in Barcellona; 1991, "S. Guzzi" prize in Lamezia Terme; 1992, "F. Civil" prize in Girona; 1995, "Festival de Musique Sacrée" in Fribourg; 1996, "Città di Viareggio" prize and "A.GI.MUS Varenna" prize in Como; 1998, "Abbazia di Villanova" prize in Verona; 2002, "Salvatore Quasimodo" prize in Cesena; 2004, "International Competition of Sacred Composition" in Lugano and "Ivan Spassov Foundation Prize" in Plovdiv (Bulgaria); 2005, "Città di Cesenatico" Composition Prize.

Several of his compositions were performed at Italian, Belgian, Spanish, Vatican and Romanian radio, and in a lot of important festivals in Italy, Spain, Greece, Belgium, Hungary and Romania as well.

His musics have been recorded by Edipan-Roma; Crescendo-Bari; Quadrivium-Perugia and Pentaphon-Roma.  His works have been published by Peters-Francoforte and Edipan-Roma.

Since 1980 Gian Paolo Luppi has worked as a teacher in various Conservatories, and since 1996 he is teacher of Composition at "G. B. Martini" Conservatory of Bologna.  In 2002 he has taught as guest professor at the Royal Unversity of Stockolm.  In 2003 he has thaught as guest professor at the Royal Conservatory of Bruxelles.  In 2005 he has taught Composition at the Summercourse of Mirecourt (France).

Internationally highly acclaimed, Ludwig Albert belongs with the top-flight of marimbists nowadays.  After obtaining with greatest distinctions a First prize Percussion, the Superior Diploma and a Masterdegree specialisation marimba at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Antwerp-Belgium, he was in 1994 the first Belgian marimbist admitted to the Toho Gakuan Music School in Tokyo, where he studied marimba specialisation with the Japanese marimba-virtuoso Ms. Keiko Abe.  Afterwards he was invited by Ms Abe and performed with her several concert tours such as: 'Keiko Abe plays Keiko Abe' (1996 Belgium), 'Ludwig Albert in concert' (Osaka-Japan 1996), 'Keiko Abe charity gala concert' (1996 Japan), Belgium Tour 1997 & 2000: 'Dialogue in Nature/ K.Abe & L.Albert in concert', Japan Tour 1997: 'Dialogue in Nature', 'Concert International academy' (Belgium 2007).

Starting 1995 Ludwig Albert searched for new sound-combinations and founded the duo 'Patrasche' with the unique combination of marimba & voice.  As true pioneers of this combination, they developed a style of their own and knows to inspire several artists and composers to create new music for this strenght.  They mainly perform Albert's own compositions, creations and improvisations, all based on International traditional folksongs.  Their musical combination evokes a fascinating world.  For their first album 'Japanese Impressions', prefaced by Keiko Abe, they received International outstanding critics and they were regular invited guests of several dedicated radio-broadcastings & Festivals.  In 2002 they released their second album 'Impressions of the low-countries' and are preparing nowadays their newest production (release 2008).

Read more on his web site

Dirk Verelst, violinist and conductor, studied at the Royal Flemish Conservatory of Antwerp with Franz Wigy and in Geneva with Henryk Szeryng.  Afterwards he specialized in the performance of 18th century music with Sigiswald Kuijken and became a member of the Baroque Ensemble "La Petite Bande".  With this ensemble, he played concerts all over the world and was able to perform on radio and television and to record for well-known labels such as Erato, Telefunken, Harmonia Mundi, Philips and Séon.  He was guest professor and conductor at the Xing-Hai Conservatory of Guangzhou (China), guest professor at The Korean International University of Arts in Seoul and guest-conductor of the Collegium Musicum of Kyiv.

Since 2003, he is the artistic director and conductor of the Love2Arts Company.  In collaboration with the famous Lakatos Ensemble he was conducting concerts and live TV and DVD productions in Leipzig, Prague, Poznan, Beograd, Cannes, Ankara, Istanbul and Brussels.  He was invited as a jury member during different international competitions such as the International Shabyt Violin competition in Astana (Kazakhstan), and the International Violin Competition in Cremona (Italy).

During Summer Courses he is guest professor and conductor on different Master-Classes with his friends and colleagues, such as M. Bezverkhny, H. Krebbers, Ph. Hirschhorn, R. Lakatos, I. Frolov, I. Oistrakh, S-J Lee and many others.

Presently, Dirk Verelst is violin and chamber music professor at the Royal Flemish Conservatory of Antwerp and at the University of State (department Conservatory) in Maastricht.

Since 1991, Dirk Verelst is the president of the International Academy of Arts and since 2006 the President of Love2Arts.

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