Winners Announced in the 2020 Midwest National Chamber Music Competition

(HIGHWOOD, IL) The Midwest National Chamber Music Competition announces the winners of the 2020 competition held February 16, 2020 at Bennett Gordon Hall at Ravinia in Highland Park, IL. Formerly known as the Discover Competition, the event, hosted by Midwest Young Artists Conservatory, provides an educational and competitive experience for young chamber ensembles. The competition is open to all instrumental chamber ensembles in 12th grade and younger, and consists of two divisions (Open and MYAC) in the following two categories:

• Strings and Piano
• All Other Instruments (brass, percussion, voice, winds).

Contestants compete for over $5,000 in cash prizes and scholarships, and the winner of each category in each division performs in a Winners Recital. 

This year’s competition was judged by:

Young Whun Kim, piano (Indiana University)
Callisto Quartet: Rachel Aguilar, violin; Paul Aguilar, Eva Kennedy, Viola; Hannah Moses, cello (Rice University)
John Dee, oboe (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)

Winning ensembles will perform Saturday March 7 at 7 p.m. at the “Music At The Fort” concert series at MYAC Center at 878 Lyster Rd, in Highwood, IL.

The full list of winners from this annual competition is as follows:

Open Division:
Insieme Piano Trio – Overall and Open Strings Winner
Sonya Jones: violin/viola, Abigail Park: violin/viola, Ashley Kim: piano (Music Institute of Chicago Academy, Sang Mee Lee and Abe Stokman: Coaches)

Infini Quartet – Honorable Mention (Open Strings Category) Sameer Agrawal: violin, Linda Wang: violin/viola, Kelly Kim: violin/viola, Mia Wimbiscus: cello (Academy of Music Institute of Chicago, Rodolfo Vieira: Coach)

Marquis String Quartet – Honorable Mention (Open Strings Category)
Cecilia O’Malley: violin, Kenneth Bechtel: violin, Julian Tugaoen: viola, Eric Spain: cello (Chamber Music Connection, Deborah Price: Coach)

Purple Hippopotami Flute Quartet – Winner (Open Winds)
Katherine Chen: flute, Natalia Kozintseva: flute, Emma Krause: flute, Nina Touboul: flute (Merit School of Music, Betsy Ko: Coach)

Precipice Saxophone Quartet – Honorable Mention (Open Winds Category)
Cole Moorhead: soprano saxophone, Emmett Connolly: alto saxophone, Navdeep Natt: tenor saxophone, Christopher Li: baritone sax (Merit School of Music, Thomas Snydacker: Coach)

MYAC Division:
Trio Domino – Honorary Winner, Winner 2019*
John Lee: violin, Samuel Du: cello, Myroslav Mykhailenko, piano (Midwest Young Artists Conservatory, Lyudmila Lakisova: Coach)

Quartet Lucciola – Overall and MYAC Strings Winner Bella Kim: viola, Liam Diethrich: violin, Veronica Rokicki: violin, Trudie Childs: cello (Midwest Young Artists Conservatory, Dr. Allan Dennis and Robert Bassill: Coaches) 

Ardente String Quartet – Honorable Mention (MYAC Strings)
Ella Saputra: violin, Ruth Kim: violin, Julie Kim: viola, Haoming Song: cello (Midwest Young Artists Conservatory, Dr. Allan Dennis and Robert Bassill: Coaches) 

Trio Reine – Honorable Mention (MYAC Strings)
Grace Mockus: cello, Eva Sharman: piano, Miriam Friedman: violin (Midwest Young Artists Conservatory, Tatyana Stepanova: Coach)

Trio Vento – Winner (MYAC Winds) Timothy Zhang: oboe, Eric Butler: clarinet, Peter Marshall: piano (Midwest Young Artists Conservatory, Matthew Oliphant: Coach)

*The competition rules state that a group must play for comments if 50% of more members were previous winners.  As 2/3's of Trio Domino won the 2019 Discover Chamber Music Competition, they are unable to be the winner of this year's competition.  However, the judge's appreciated their performance and would like to recognize them as the Honorary Winner.

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MYAC’s classical, jazz, and choral programs serve students from grade school beginners to advanced pre-collegiate performers.Families interested in participating  in the 2020-21 season can visit mya.org for placement audition information. For tickets to MYAC concerts and events, or more information about our  programs
visit mya.org or call 847-926-9898.