Berliner Philharmoniker's Karajan Academy Announces Siemens Conductors Scholarship

Conductor Dayner Tafur-Díaz, from Peru, has won the prestigious opportunity

Since 2020, the Siemens Arts Program has been giving scholarships to a conductor as part of the Karajan-Akademie’s training program. In addition to the regular two-year academy training, the chosen student assists the chief conductor of the Berliner Philharmoniker, Kirill Petrenko in addition to conducting their own concert with the Karajan-Akademie Chamber Orchestra in the Chamber Music Hall of the Philharmonie Berlin.

This year's winner, chosen from a selective group of three, is conductor Dayner Tafur-Díaz.

Tafur-Díaz, along with Anna Isabella Handler and Luka Hauser, each had a rehearsal with a chamber orchestra made up of members of the Karajan Akademie and a personal interview to get to know the artist's personality.

They performed Richard Wagner's Siegfried Idyll and Aaron Coplan's Appalachian Spring Suite.

The jury included Andrea Zietzschmann, Simon Rössler, Stefan Dohr, Eva Tomasi, Prof. Dr. Stephan Frucht, and Stefan Schweigert.

Born in Peru in 1998, Dayner Tafur-Diaz began his musical training as a trumpet player. In September 2017, settled in Germany and as part of a voluntary service in Berlin, he assisted conductor Knut Andreas as director of the numerous ensembles and youth orchestras of the Musikgymnasium Georg-Friedrich Händel.

In 2018, he began training as an ensemble and choir conductor at the Berufsfachschule für Musik Mittelfranken, specializing in conducting with Uwe Münch. In October 2023, he won the German Conducting Award, presented jointly by the WDR Symphony Orchestra, the Cologne Gürzenich Orchestra and the Ensemble and Internationales Opernstudio of the Cologne Opera.

In August 2022, he won First Prize in the second edition of the International Opera conducting Competition of the Opéra Royal de Wallonie-Liège (Belgium) and, in November 2022, Second Prize in the conducting competition of the University of Almeria (Spain). He has also been selected as one of the 20 finalists for the 2023 Mahler Competition.

Among the orchestras with which Dayner Tafur-Díaz has worked are the Orchestra del Teatro Comunale di Bologna, the Orchestre Symphonique de Mulhouse, the Opéra Royal de Wallonie-Liège, the Stuttgarter Philharmoniker, the Stuttgarter Kammerorchester, the Württembergische Philharmonie Reutlingen, the Philharmonie Baden-Baden, the Südwestdeutsche Philharmonie Konstanz, the Badische Philharmonie Pforzheim and Juan Diego Flores’ orchestra “Sinfonía por el Peru”.

As an assistant, he worked with Giampaolo Bisanti in productions of Alzira (Verdi) and Sonnambula (Bellini) at the Opéra Royal de Wallonie-Liège during the 22/23 session.

Since October 2019, Dayner Tafur-Diaz has been studying at the Hochschule für Musik und Darstellende Kunst in Stuttgart, Bachelor Orchesterdirigieren with Professor Rasmus Baumann, and since 2023, he has been a scholarship holder of the Forum Dirigieren of the Deutscher Musikrat.