The Borletti Buitoni Trust Announces 2024 Awards

Winners of the £30,000 award include the Leonkoro Quartet and the Mithras Trio 

Founded in 2003, the Borletti-Buitoni Trust (BBT) supports exceptional young musicians in developing international careers with awards funding tailor-made projects. 

The £30,000 BBT Awards are given to well-established artists or ensembles that are deemed by the Artistic Committee as performers of great musicianship. The £20,000 BBT Fellowships are awarded to those in the early stages of their careers.

BBT’s Awards and Fellowships are awarded every other year on March 17 to mark the birthday of Franco Buitoni (1934-2016), the co-founder of BBT with his wife llaria Borletti Buitoni.

This year’s BBT Award recipients are the Leonkoro Quartet, comprising violinists Jonathan Schwarz and Amelie Wallner, violist Mayu Konoe, and cellist Lukas Schwarz, and the Mithras Trio, which includes violinist lonel Manciu, cellist Leo Popplewell, and pianist Dominic Degavino. 

The Fellowship recipients are violinist Hana Chang, double bassist Will Duerden, soprano Lucy Fitz Gibbon, pianist Jaeden Izik-Dzurko, and clarinetist Jonathan Leibovitz. 

BBT is currently discussing the range of creative and innovative projects for which these artists will be seeking the Trust’s support. They include commissioning and recording works, to multi-genre concerts for diverse audiences.

Each of the winning recipients will receive tailored support as they create their individual projects, and will receive practical career advice.

“Perhaps the greatest pleasure of my first months leading the [BBT] has been getting to know the artists we are supporting, and to understand their ambitions and hopes for the future,” said BBT’s chief executive Toby Smith. “And now it is an equal pleasure to share with you the 12 remarkable artists with whom the Trust will co-create bespoke programmes to energize their artistic development over the next years.

“I am so looking forward to working alongside these artists and the brilliant BBT team to build on the vision of llaria Borletti Buitoni and her late husband Franco Buitoni, to nurture musicians who are shaping a future where classical music's remit and reach is urgent, relevant and broad,” Smith added. “Join me in getting to know these artists and their extraordinary music-making over the next years.”

Established in 2017 at London’s Guildhall School of Music and Drama, the Mithras Trio has won top prizes at the Trondheim International Chamber Music and Royal Over-Seas League competitions. In 2023, they released their debut album, “Eros,” on Linn Records.

The Leonkoro Quartet formed in 2019 in Berlin. It has won top awards at the Premio Paolo Borciani International String Quartet Competition, Jürgen Ponto Foundation, International String Quartet Competition Wigmore Hall, Concours International de Quatuor à Bordeaux, MERITO String Quartet Award, and is a recipient of the BBC New Generation Artists scheme. 

Studying at the Kronberg Academy, Hana Chang’s mentors have included Christian Tetzlaff, Ida Kavafian, and Janine Jansen. Recent performances include the Prague Radio Symphony, Philharmonie Baden-Baden, and Stuttgart Philharmonic Orchestra. She plays a 1647 Nicolo Amati violin kindly on loan from Singapore’s Rin Collection.

Will Duerden is an ABRSM Scholar at London’s Royal College of Music and a Yehudi Menuhin School scholarship holder. A finalist in the 2018 BBC Young Musician of the Year Competition, he has collaborated with artists including Alexander Sitkovetsky, Lawrence Power, and Maxim Rysanov.

Lucy Fitz Gibbon frequently performs at Carnegie Hall, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Park Avenue Armory and Merkin Hall, Kimmel Center, and Koerner Hall, plus has performed solo with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Tafelmusik, Naples Philharmonic, and several U.S. orchestras. 

Jonathan Leibovitz was a YCAT and Concert Artists Guild artist in 2022. His 2023/24 season highlights include the Alte Oper Frankfurt, Konzerthaus Berlin, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, and Vancouver Recital Society. He will release his debut recording with Delphian Records later this year. 

Jaeden Izik-Dzurko has played with orchestras such as the Calgary Philharmonic, Orquesta Sinfónica de Madrid, Real Orquesta Sinfónica de Sevilla, and Bilbao Orkestra Sinfonikoa. He has attended both The Juilliard School and the University of British Columbia and won top prizes at the Hilton Head, Maria Canals, and Paloma O'Shea Santander International Piano Competitions.