SECOND EDITION 2025 14-16 NOV 2025
BERLIN - LONDON - VIENNA - PARIS
A MUSIC CELEBRATION FEATURING PIANO MUSIC IN EUROPEAN SALONS
SECOND EDITION 2025 14-16 NOV 2025
BERLIN - LONDON - VIENNA - PARIS
A MUSIC CELEBRATION FEATURING PIANO MUSIC IN EUROPEAN SALONS
As a soloist, Tony Yang has performed internationally in venues such as the Tokyo Metropolitan Theatre, Carnegie Hall in New York, the National Philharmonic in Warsaw, Seoul Arts Center, the National Arts Centre in Ottawa, Osaka Symphony Hall, Koerner Hall in Toronto, Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory, Severance Hall in Cleveland, Esplanade Singapore, Teatro Municipal in São Paulo, Stadtcasino Basel, Milan Conservatory, Aula Simfonia Jakarta, and the Millennium Amphitheatre in Dubai.
Concerto highlights include appearances with the Cleveland Orchestra, Warsaw Philharmonic, Orchestre Métropolitain, Fort Worth Symphony, Basel Proms Orchestra, Ontario Philharmonic, Jakarta Sinfonietta, Toronto Sinfonietta, Edmonton Symphony, Changsha Symphony, Chongqing Symphony, Hilton Head Symphony Orchestra, Symphony Nova Scotia, and the Hohhot Philharmonic.
Tony is also passionate about the role of music in the greater community. Among his most devoted projects include a comprehensive collaboration with Looking at the Stars, a charity that brings classical music to prisons and correctional facilities across Canada, Lithuania, and the United States. Tony also works closely with Chamber Music Kenya as an ambassador of piano performance and education to eastern Africa, as well as the Guangdong Disabled Persons’ Federation to bring live music to visually-impaired youth in the Guangdong province. Since 2018, Tony has been appointed a Youth Cultural Ambassador for the City of Guangzhou.
Tony has also performed for dozens of royalty, dignitaries, and ambassadors such as HRH Camilla, the Queen Consort of the United Kingdom, HRH Queen Mathilde of Belgium, former Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, former Kuwaiti Prime Minister Sheikh Nasser Al-Sabah, and Polish President Andrzej Duda, among others.
Born in Chongqing and raised in Toronto, Tony is a recent graduate of Harvard University where he obtained a Bachelor of Arts in Economics. He is Artist-in-Residence at the Ingesund Piano Center in Sweden and at the Chinese University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen, and in the past, was a fellow at the Oberlin-Lake Como International Piano Academy. Currently pursuing his Master of Music at the Hochschule für Musik, Theater und Medien Hannover under Prof. Arie Vardi, Tony is a recent recipient of the Harvard University Robert Levin Prize in Musical Performance, and is named as “One To Watch” by Scala Radio UK.
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Giovanni De Cecco
“ I studied privately with Venetian organist Maestro Giovanni Ferrari, and then graduated in piano from the “Benedetto Marcello” Conservatory in Venice with Anna Barutti. Meanwhile I graduated in Philosophy from the “Ca’Foscary” University of the same city.
I started my musical career with ethnomusicological journeys following Bela Bartók’s footsteps in Romania, studying Romanian and Hungarian traditional music. In concert halls I performed my arrangements of Romanian musical folklore, in various Klezmer and chamber ensembles.
I am a passionate player of historical keyboards, primarily clavichord, above all of the galant style and Sturm und Drang repertoire. I play in chamber ensembles specialized in 18th century keyboard sonatas with accompaniment (J.Schobert, C.Balbastre…).
I have performed in Germany, Hungary, Austria, Romania, Italy, Sweden, Czech Republic, Iran, Turkey, the United States, Japan, Thailand, Cambodia, Indonesia, Hong Kong.
I combine my activity as a concert performer with my work as a teacher in numerous master classes, especially in Asia. In November 2016 the Italian label La Bottega Discantica produced my clavichord album “Bach Venetian concertos”.
In 2017 I started the first world recording of the whole Mozart keyboard sonatas on the clavichord for the Italian label Da Vinci Classic , which I have finished and released in 2022. In 2019 the same label released my double album “6 concerti per il cembalo concertato” by C.Ph.E. Bach on the clavichord. “
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The brilliant young French pianist Dimitri Malignan impresses juries, critics, and the public by his level of maturity, his musical intelligence and great sensibility. Winner at only 19 years of age of the Prix Cortot 2017, he was recently awarded in 2021 the 3rd Prize as well as the Audience Award and the Bach Award at the Concours Musical International de Montréal.
Born in Paris in 1998 to architect parents in a music-loving family of Romanian origins, he is the grandson of composer Henry Mălineanu (1920-2000). Dimitri Malignan began his piano studies at the age of 5 with Nicolas Horvath.
His musical upbringing is rich from the teachings of several masters of diverse backgrounds ; his natural curiosity and desire to deepen his education brought him to multiple countries.
Dimitri Malignan’s precocious gifts were spotted by Jean-Paul Sévilla in 2010, whose valuable teaching would be determinant to his formation and musical evolution.
In 2011, Ludmila Berlinskaya – Sviatoslav Richter’s disciple – welcomed him to her class at the Ecole Normale de Musique de Paris ‘Alfred Cortot’. He obtained with highest merits all the Ecole’s diplomas up to the Artist Diploma – Prix Cortot 2017, of which he is the youngest laureate.
From 2016, he completed his musical education at the Conservatory of Amsterdam (the Netherlands) with Naum Grubert. In 2020, at the age of 22, he graduated from the Master program, cum laude.
In 2022, he was selected in the prestigious class of Benedetto Lupo at the Academy of Santa Cecilia in Rome (Italy).
He took part in Masterclasses by renowned pianists such as Angela Hewitt, András Schiff, Jean-Philippe Collard, Boris Giltburg, Boris Berman, Claudio Martínez Mehner, David Fray and Robert Durso. He also followed classes at the Academy of French Music for Piano in Paris (2018-2019) and at the Academy of Music of Pinerolo in Italy (2021-2022). He has been regularly working with Brigitte Bouthinon-Dumas in Paris since 2013.
Laureate of more than 20 international competitions, he notably won the 3rd Prize, as well as the Audience Award and the J.S. Bach Award at the Concours International Musical de Montréal. He also won the 3rd Prize at the Osaka International Music Competition (2009), the 2nd Prize at the ‘American Protégé’ Competition in New-York (2009), the 1st Prize at the ‘Anton García-Abril’ International Piano Competition in Teruel (2011), the 1st Prize at the ‘Mihail Jora’ Music Competition in Bucharest (2016) and the 5th Prize at the ‘Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’ International Piano Competition in Saint-Priest (2019). In 2020, he won a Scholarship Award of the Yamaha Music Foundation of Europe. In 2023, he was awarded the Excellency Prize from the French-Romanian European Summit in Paris.
Dimitri Malignan regularly performs in France and abroad in major venues : Salle Cortot & Salle Colonne (Paris), Salle de l’Institut (Orléans), Opéra de Reims, St Martin-in-the-Fields (London), Konzerthaus (Berlin), De Duif (Amsterdam), Merkin Concert Hall (New-York), Sala Casella (Rome), Romanian Athenaeum and Royal Palace (Bucharest), Philharmonics of Timisoara and Craiova (Romania), Philharmonic of Chisinau (Moldova), Great Hall of the State Conservatory of Tashkent (Uzbekistan), Tchaikovsky Museum in Klin (Russia), but also in Canada, Germany, Denmark, Belgium and Monaco. He was invited to prestigious festivals such as Flâneries Musicales de Reims, Nohant Festival Chopin, Piano en Valois, Nuits du Piano d’Erbalunga, La Clé des Portes, Festival Terraqué, Piano-Folies du Touquet, Festival International Albert-Roussel, and Trasimeno Music Festival. He worked with celebrated orchestra conductors such as Maestros Yoav Talmi, Willem de Bordes, Gian Luigi Zampieri and Clément Mao-Takacs.
Dimitri Malignan is also passionate about promoting unknown music. In 2020, he initiated the “Missing Voices” project, dedicated to Jewish composers who were murdered in the Shoah. After months of research, he organized concerts with this music and produced a documentary movie, and he hopes to get these talented composers out of the shameful oversight that surrounds them. A serious chamber musician, he co-founded in Amsterdam the ‘Bosmans & Beyond Ensemble’ to promote Dutch female composers, and regularly performs with talented musicians.
After having recorded his first CD in 2018 with works of Schumann and Prokofiev (Passavant Music), Dimitri Malignan has published his newest album entitled ‘J.S. Bach Peregrinations’ (Editions Hortus) in March 2022, which received numerous positive reviews.In 2024, he released two chamber music albums, one dedicated to Pál Hermann (Toccata Classics) and another one entitled ‘Elegies and Echoes’, with soprano Elizaveta Agrafenina (Sheva Collection).
Dimitri Malignan has been regularly practicing Qi Gong, Tai Chi and Feldenkrais for many years. He is convinced of their beneficial aspects for a healthy musicianship. He is also passionate about tennis and aviation, and is often to be found training on flight simulators.
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Prof. Dr. Monika Henneman, Musicologist
“ I am Professor of Music at Cardiff University School of Music, International Dean for the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences, and a Co-Director of the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research into Opera and Drama (CIRO).
As a scholar, I am a musicologist, cultural historian, linguist and translator. My main interests are the music, literature, and art of the German- and English- speaking world from the late eighteenth century to the present day. Specialisms include 19th-century opera; Lieder, song, and performance-practice; and the music of Mendelssohn, Liszt and Webern. My recent monograph Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdys Opernprojekte im kulturellen Kontext der deutschen Opern- und Librettogeschichte, 1820-1850 (Felix Mendelssohn’s Opera Projects in the Cultural Context of German Opera and Libretto History from 1820-1850) has been described as “a groundbreaking study… rigorous in its scholarship, insightful in its interpretations.” I am currently working on the theatrical performance history of Liszt’s St Elizabeth and other oratorios, as well as concepts of adaptive intercultural theater based on Western opera performances in in the East.
I studied at Johannes Gutenberg-Universität in Germany, and at the Florida State University in the US. As a musician, I play the piano, violin and Baroque recorder, and, whenever my other duties allow, enjoy singing in choirs.
I have previously worked in both university Music and German departments, and in music conservatories. Before taking up my current role, I have held academic positions in Musicology at the College Conservatory of Music in Cincinnati (US), the Florida State University (US) as Orpheus Endowed Scholar, and at Birmingham University (UK), as well as in German Studies/Translation at the University of Rhode Island (US) and in the School of Modern Languages at Cardiff University.
In addition to my research interests, I have long experience as a professional translator. I am a fully qualified Goethe Institut examiner and DAAD Ortslektorin, and for several years offered postgraduate seminars on German for Musicologists at the Institute of Advanced Studies in London. I was recently interviewed for the magazine Der Spiegel about my experiences as a German living in Wales, and I work closely with the Welsh Government’s office in Berlin to promote Welsh culture to German audiences.
In my international role, I negotiate and curate links with partner institutions overseas, and share responsibility for international student mobility and recruitment, and for international staff exchange. For over two decades, I have developed and maintained extensive contacts with Universities, Conservatories and Colleges in the US, Europe, China and South East Asia. I jointly oversee the School of Music’s partnership with South China Normal University, and work keenly to help our overseas students assimilate to Western methods of study and learning. I am the co-founder and Convenor of the Royal Music Association’s Southeast Asia Chapter, and undertake regular lectures in China, Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand. I have a particularly strong association with Singapore, where I have for many years enjoyed giving annual guest classes for young musicians at Raffles Institution and Raffles Girls School, and at Temasek Junior College.
I have presented numerous papers at the Annual Meetings of the American Musicological Society (AMS), the Royal Musical Association (RMA), and the Gesellschaft für Musikforschung in Germany. Recent engagements have included an AMS paper on musical politics and Mendelssohn’s Elijah, and keynote lectures for the Princess Galyani Institute in Thailand and Xiamen University in China. I have participated in the University of Macau’s Department of English Distinguished Lecture Series, and presented at many other institutions worldwide, including the University of California at Berkeley, Brown University, Duke University, the University of New Hampshire (US); Graz Universität (Austria); Opéra National de Paris, the Université de Rouen (France); the Royal Opera House, London, the Royal College of Music, London (UK); Heidelberg Universität, Bremen Universität, the Klassik Stiftung Weimar (Germany); and the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts (Singapore).
My broadcast credits include a recent interview (2020) on the Austrian composer Anton Webern’s play Tot for ORF, regular work for the BBC Proms and BBC Radio 3, several programmes on the appreciation of Classical music for Chicago Public Radio, and the television broadcast “Mendelssohn in Scotland” (part of the series “Artists and Landscapes” for Deutsche Welle Germany/USA).
I welcome enquiries about postgraduate research/doctoral studies on interdisciplinary topics related to 19th- and 20th-century music and language; opera and oratorio; Lieder, song, and performance-practice; adaptation in music; and libretto studies.”