Quarter-Finalists Announced at Shanghai Isaac Stern International Violin Competition

Taking place online between August 12-22, 2021, the quarter-finals and semi-finals rounds will be streamed on The Violin Channel

Held biannually, the competition is open to international violinists between ages 16 and 32. This year's Quarter-Finalists come from 17 different countries/regions and the 2021 first prize winner will receive USD $100,000. 

This edition of the competition was originally scheduled for 2020, but was rescheduled as a result of the pandemic.

The 2021 Quarter-Finalists are:

• Yunfei Bai (China)

• Marie Bégin (Canada)

• Stefan Besan (Romania)

• Angela Sin Ying Chan (Hong Kong, China)

• KayCee Galano (Philippines)

• Maja Horvat (Slovenia)

• Sayuri Kuru (Japan)

• Alice Lee (Canada)

• Shannon Lee (United States)

• William Lee (Taiwan, China)

• Thomas Lefort (France)

• Ruifeng Lin (China)

• Charlie Lovell-Jones (United Kingdom)

• Nao Mizukoshi (Japan)

• Elias David Moncado (Germany)

• Ashley Jeehyun Park (United States)

• Yue Qian (China)

• Felicitas Schiffner (Germany)

• Zixuan Shen (China)

• Steven Song (United States)

• Haozhe Song (China)

• Stepan Starikov (Russia)

• Sophia Su (United States)

• Katherine Woo (United States)

• Rino Yoshimoto (Japan)

• Arata Yumi (Japan)

• Jingzhi Zhang (China)

The quarter-final and semi-final rounds will be held online this year and the six finalists will travel to Shanghai in 2022 for the final round. The jury will adjudicate online from all around the world.

“The pandemic has dealt a blow to the global performing arts industry, and it has also caused many young people to lose opportunities," said the president of the Organization Committee Long Yu. "We cannot let them wait for too long. The violin competition is restarting online, and we hope to give a stage to young people from different countries to allow them to display their talents, realize their dreams, and use music to convey confidence and hope to the world."

This year's jury is comprised of David Stern (Co-Chairman), Vera Tsu Weiling (Co-Chairman), Martin Campbell-White, Glenn Dicterow, Emmanuel Hondré, Weigang Li, Ning Feng, Philip Setzer, Hagai Shaham, Joel Smirnoff, Kyoko Takezawa, Maxim Vengerov, and Jian Wang.