Dora Kokas cello, Marianna Shirinyan piano
Monday 24 April 2023, 7.30pm at the Razumovsky Academy, 56 College Road NW10 5ET
7pm doors open
7.30pm concert
9pm reception
Tickets:
£30 (£15 students and under 25s)
£40 (£20 students and under 25s) to include post-concert drinks reception
For further details and booking request please contact [email protected]
PROGRAMME
Dmitry Shostakovich Sonata for cello and piano in D minor Op.40
Sergei Rachmaninov Sonata for cello and piano in G minor Op. 19
Dóra Kokas was born in 1992 and has already established herself as one of the leading cellists of her generation, performing regularly as a soloist with orchestras and as a chamber musician. Dóra studied at the Ferenc Liszt Music Academy with Miklós Perényi and at the Razumovsky Academy in London with Oleg Kogan.
She has been awarded top Prizes in national and international cello competitions since her childhood. In September 2016, Dóra won 2nd prize at the 23. International Johannes Brahms Competition in Austria. In 2015, She has received the Gundel Prize in Hungary and in October She became the winner of Junior Prima Prize in Hungary. Dóra also won two prizes at the Pablo Casals International Cello Competition in Budapest in September 2014. In the December of 2014 she won the Liszt Academy Soloist Competition in Budapest, Hungary.
Dora has performed in ensembles with Joshua Bell, Ferenc Rados, Joseph Lendvay, Pekka Kuusisto, Nicholas Altstaedt, Maxim Rysanov, José Gallardo and Peter Frankl, Jonathan Cohen, Alexander Rudin, Vilde Frang, Sergei Nakarjakov, Alexander Sitkovetsky and Boris Brovtsyn among others.
Dóra has performed Saint-Saens’ Cello Concerto at the Young Talents International Music Festival’s Gala Concert in Kaunas – Lithuania in April 2006 with the Kaunas Symphony Orchestra. She had played at some of Europe’s famous concert halls such as the Mozarteum of Salzburg, the Teatro Malibran of Venice, including recitals in Verona, Ljubljana, Klagenfurt, Brussels, Budapest, Pécs, and Kaposvár. At the early age of nine years, Dóra played a recital at the Prussia Cove International Music Seminar in England with Péter Nagy, pianist.
She has also performed with the Zagreb Chamber Orchestra and the MÁV Chamber-Symphony Budapest, conducted by Gábor Takács-Nagy. In 2010, Dóra performed Haydn’s G-Major Trio with Zoltán Kocsis and Barnabás Kelemen.
Dóra is a founding member of the Prize Winning Kelemen Quartet (2010-2015) , one of Hungary’s leading ensembles. Apart from concerts in Melbourne, Switzerland, Italy, Germany, Austria and Croatia, the quartet has been re-invited after its successful debut tour in the USA (New York, Greenwich, Dallas), India and Australia. Kelemen Quartet won the 2nd Prize, the Audience Prize and the ‘Musica Viva’special Prize at the 6th International Chamber Music Competition in Melbourne 2011. They also received 1st prize at the Beijing International Quartet Competition and in 2014 they won the gold medal at the Premio Paolo Borciani Competition in Reggio Emilia.
Dóra attended masterclasses with János Starker, Steven Isserlis, Gary Hoffman, Jens Peter Meinz, Wolfgang Boettcher, Jonathan Cohen, Miklós Perényi, László Mező, Csaba Onczay.
Dóra is performing on a Domenico Montagnana cello c.1730
Armenian-born Marianna Shirinyan is one of the most creative and in sought after pianists in Europe today. Her vibrant and virtuos musicianship puts her in demand, both as soloist and as chamber musician. Shirinyan plays with great sensitivity, understanding, technical brilliance and beauty of tone, which allows her to offer a wide range of repertoire. Her love for the music and her joy in sharing it with a larger audience are apparent in her performances.
She has received Danish Broadcasting Corporation’s prestigious P2 award for her contribution to Danish music life and the critics prize of the association of Danish critics. She is a frequent guest at a string of international music festivals, among them the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival, Bodensee Festival, the Schwetzinger Festspiele, MDR Summer Music Festival, Festspillene in Bergen.
Marianna has garnered a reputation as a leading pianist of her generation through solo appearances with orchestras such as the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Danish National Symphony Orchestra, Oslo, Helsinki and Copenhagen Philharmonic Orchestras, Potsdammer Kammerakademie, Göteborg Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre Philharmonique de Nice, among others. She enjoyed collaborations with conductors such as Lawrence Foster, Zoltan Kocsis, Antonello Manacorda, Jun Märkl, Daniel Raiskin, Lan Shui, Thomas Søndergård, Krysztof Urbanski and Joshua Weilerstein.
Marianna Shirinyan has a bright discography. One of her later releases, the Fantasy for Piano and Orchestra by Louis Glass which she recorded together with the Rheinische Philharmonie Koblenz under the baton of Maestro Daniel Raiskin was awarded the P2 prize of the Danish radio.Marianna’s latest release Rachmaninov Suits for two pianos together with her former student Dominik Wizjan, released on Orchid classics has been highly praised by the reviewers and listeners alike.
Marianna is a professor of piano at the Royal Danish Academy of Music in Copenhagen and guest professor at the Norwegian Academy of Music in Oslo, in addition to curating several chamber music festivals across Europe.