6, WESTIN DRAGONARA RESORT,
Dragonara Road, St Julians, Malta
academy@eufsc.eu – general inquiries
participation@eufsc.eu – masterclasses inquiries
Born in St. Petersburg in 2002, Ivan Bessonov has been playing the piano since the age of six. In 2015, he made his debut as a film composer. At the moment, Ivan continues his studies at the Tchaikovsky State Conservatory Central Music School in Moscow (Valeriy Piasetsky class).
In 2016, Ivan gave his first solo recital at the Mariinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg. He has also performed with the Tatarstan State Symphony Orchestra and St. Petersburg Chapel Symphony Orchestra and took part in various music festivals touring the Russian cities.
2010 - 2015 – Six times won the Grand Prix at six annual Etudes Competitions at the St. Petersburg College of Music
2015 – Grand prix at the International Frédéric Chopin Youth Competition (St. Petersburg) 2016 – First prize winner of the International Anton Rubinstein Competition «Piano Miniature in Russian Music» (St. Petersburg)
2016 – Prize winner of the St. Petersburg Government Competition «Young Talents»
2016 – Prize winner and winner of the People's Choice Award at Grand Piano Competition (Moscow)
2017 – First prize winner of the International Competition ASTANA РIАNO PASSION-2017 (Astana)
Ivaylo Vassilev was born in 2007 in Sofia. He showed his interest for classical music and piano at a very early age. He studies piano in the National School of Music in Sofia: from 2014 to 2019 his pedagogue was Emilia Kaneva and since 2019 he continues with prof. d-r Borislava Taneva.
He has about 30 prizes from international competitions in Bulgaria, Russia, Italy, Spain, Belgium, Czechia, Greece, Germany, Kazakhstan, France, Finland, UK, most of them are first prizes and Grand-Pix. The most significant of them are: “Liszt-Bartok”, Sofia, 2020 (I prize); “Schumann-Brahms”, Plovdiv, 2020 (Grand-prix); “La Note Celeste”, Paris, 2020 (I prize); “Nutcracker”, Moscow 2018 (Golden Nutcracker - winner); "De Bach au Jazz", Athens, 2018 (Grand Prix); “Anna Artobolevskaya”, Moscow, 2017 (I prize);"Astana Piano Passion 2017" (Diplomant); "Münchner Klavierpodium”, Munich, 2016 (Winner). In 2020 he participated in his first composition competition “Artistes en Herbe", Luxembourg and was awarded with a special prize.
He has participated in several international piano festivals, like Wunderkinder 2018 (Italy), Piano Extravaganza (Sofia), Musical Olympus (St. Petersburg, 2019), Moscow Meets Friends (Moscow, 2019), South Bohemian Festival (Czechia, 2020, as finalist in “Concertino Praga 2020” competition).
Zahar Vnutskih was born in the Russian city of Perm in 2010.
He started studying piano at the age of 4 at the Polaznenskaya School of Arts under Zenkova Elena Nikolaevna.
Since 2018 he has continued his studies at the Central School of Music of the Tchaikovsky Moscow State Conservatory under Ryabova Daria Anatolievna.
Achievements:
Award winner of the XIII Regional Art Festival named after D.B. Kabalevsky “Our Perm Krai” (2018).
Laureate of the “Astana Piano Passion” Piano Competition (2019).
Finalist in the VI Russian-wide “Blue Bird” Competition (2019).
Scholar of the “New Names” Foundation (2018 – 2020).
Elisey was born in the Russian city of Stavropol and started playing piano at the age of four.
He is currently studying at the Central School of Music of Tchaikovsky Moscow State Conservatoire under Honoured Artist, Natalia Trull.
Finalist in the Russian-wide “Blue Bird” Competition (2016).
Laureate of the 1st award of the 5th International Youth Competition, “Where the art is born” (Krasnodar, 2017)
Laureate of the International “Astana Piano Passion” Piano Youth Competition (Kazakhstan, 2017)
Laureate of the 1st award of the Vladimir Krainev young pianists online-competition (2020).
Participant in the opening of the “Russian seasons” International festival (Italy, 2018).
Participant in the “The Amadeus Weekend” musical festival (Austria, 2018).
Participant in the “Classical Young Stars” musical festival (Austria, 2018).
Sofie Leifer was born in 2005 to a family of musicians in Copenhagen, Denmark. She started playing violin when she was four years old. At age eight, she began studies with Maestro Boris Belkin in Conservatory Maastricht (Netherlands). Currently, Sofie is under the tutelage of Prof. Zakhar Bron In “Z. Bron Academy “ in Interlaken (Switzerland). Sofie Leifer is a winner of first prizes in the following national and international competitions:
Soloist experience:
Fourteen-year-old British violinist Leia has performed with prestigious ensembles and orchestras across the globe, including Festival Strings Lucerne, Mariinsky Symphony Orchestra, Russian National Orchestra and the National Orchestra of Belgium.
She has played at the Salzburg, Lucerne, Rheingau Musik, Mozartfest Würzburg, White Nights and Trans-Siberian Art Festivals, to name a few, and her musical journey has also taken her to major concert halls across Europe, including the Royal Festival Hall, Brussels’ BOZAR, Berliner Philharmonie and Moscow’s Tchaikovsky Concert Hall.
Zhu’s UK concerto debut came in February 2020 with the English Chamber Orchestra, with whom she performed Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto and Dvořák’s Romance under conductor Joseph Wolfe.