Adjudicators

The Chinese pianist Ran Jia gained international attention for her extraordinary interpretative abilities in the piano works of Franz Schubert. Tan Dun praised her as a “piano poet with dramatic skill in music making.”

A special milestone in the 2016/2017 season was her highly successful debut at the Berlin Philharmonic Chamber Music Hall, where she performed the complete Schubert sonata cycle over four evenings within ten days. During the same period, she released her second Schubert sonata album under the RCA label. Other career highlights include performances with the Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale RAI in Torino, her debut at the La Roque d’Anthéron International Piano Festival in France, appearances at the Rheingau Music Festival in Germany, and collaborations with the China Philharmonic Orchestra, Guangzhou Symphony Orchestra, Hangzhou Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra under Chung Myung-Whun.

In the 2018/2019 season, Ran Jia was invited to perform the complete Schubert sonata cycle at the Shanghai Symphony Hall, where the live recording of all eleven sonatas was released in China in October 2019.
Ran Jia gave her European recital debut at age 19 with a Schubert programme at the Klavierfestival Ruhr, earning enthusiastic praise from audiences and critics alike: “With this pianist, the structures and sounds flow naturally on their own.”

She began piano lessons at the age of three and started performing publicly by seven. In November 2005, she made her debut at Alice Tully Hall, Lincoln Center, New York. Ran Jia studied with Gary Graffman at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, at the Hochschule für Musik Köln in Germany, and at the International Piano Academy Lake Como in Italy with William Grant Naboré. Since 2022, she has served as Associate Professor of Piano at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music.

Noriko Ogawa has achieved international renown since her success at the Leeds International Piano Competition. Noriko’s “ravishingly poetic playing” (Telegraph) sets her apart from her contemporaries as well as the acclaim for her complete Debussy series with BIS Records, where she is an exclusive recording artist boasting 42 titles in their catalogue.

Ranging from Mozart, Rachmaninov, Satie, Debussy to contemporary composers including Vagn Holmboe and Yoshihiro Kanno, Noriko boasts a prolific catalogue of over 30 albums. Her discography includes Takemitsu’s Riverrun (Editor’s Choice, Gramophone), Mussorgsky’s Pictures from an Exhibition (Critics’ Choice, BBC Music Magazine), and the complete solo piano music of Debussy and Eric Satie. With the Singapore Symphony Orchestra, she has recorded the complete piano concertos of Alexander Tcherepnin.

As a much sought-after guest educator, Noriko is a professor at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, Tokyo College of Music and Music Director of Hamamatsu International Piano Academy. Noriko is a Visiting Professor for Yamaha Masterclasses and at Chetham’s International Piano Summer School. Other teaching commitments this season include the Yeon Cheon Piano Academy in Korea.

Noriko regularly judges at international competitions. This season saw her perform in the Channel Islands, along with adjudication positions at several prestigious competitions including Singapore’s National Piano and Violin Competition, Singapore International Piano Competition, Kawai International Piano Competition and Dublin International Piano Competition. Noriko was the chairperson for the 10th to the 12th Hamamatsu International Piano Competition, and a board member of the World Federation of International Music Competitions during her term. In 2025, Noriko performed the world premiere of Yoshihiro Kanno’s Piano Concerto No. 1 ‘Mirror Maze’ with the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra and also worked with Chief Conductor of the Japan Philharmonic, Kahchun Wong.

Noriko is passionate about charity work, particularly after the earthquake and tsunami which devastated Japan in early 2011, raising over £40,000 for the British Red Cross Japan Tsunami Fund. Noriko also founded Jamie’s Concerts, a series for autistic children and parents, and is a Cultural Ambassador for the National Autistic Society.

Described as an ‘endlessly fascinating artist’, Ashley Wass’s musical career is one of unusual creativity and variety. Alongside his work as soloist and chamber musician, he is co-founder of Mash Productions, was Artistic Director of the Lincolnshire International Chamber Music Festival for eleven years, and was formerly Director of Music at the Yehudi Menuhin School (UK) and the Yehudi Menuhin School Qingdao. The diverse list of people and organisations with whom he has collaborated include film festivals, art galleries and animators, children’s television presenters and stars of the stage and screen, illustrators, literary festivals and renowned authors, and mime artists and comedians.

Ashley’s watershed moment came in 1997 when he won the London International Piano Competition, a success that led to a recording contract with Naxos, making him the first solo artist to obtain an exclusive deal with the label. He was also a prizewinner at the Leeds Piano Competition, and is a former BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artist. Since then, he has performed at many of the world’s finest concert halls and with major orchestras around the globe.

Ashley has received great critical acclaim for his recordings of music from a wide range of styles and eras. He returned to the studio in late 2023 to record a retrospective album called ‘Black and White’ for Blue Cloud, which streamed well over a million times. His most recent recording is an album called 'Meditations', recorded with his wife, the violinist Doriane Gable, in 2025.

Ashley was Professor of Piano at the Royal College of Music from 2008-2018, Deputy Head of Keyboard Studies at the Royal Northern College of Music from 2018-2020, and was Director of Music of the Yehudi Menuhin School from 2020-2025. He was also the founding Director of Music at the Yehudi Menuhin School in Qingdao. He now teaches at the Maastricht Conservatorium.

Today, Ashley's greatest passion is to find ways to support the wellbeing of musicians around the world. He is the Founder and Artistic Director of Zenezen, an innovative new platform, due to launch in 2026, that aspires to foster a greater sense of togetherness across the musical community.

Swedish-born violinist Erik Heide graduated from the Royal Danish Academy of Music in Copenhagen in 1998 after studies with Milan Vitek. He furthered his studies at the Musikhochschule in Cologne with the Alban Berg quartet and in Helsinki with Ralf Gothóni.

Erik is one of Scandinavia’s most acclaimed chamber musicians and has together with his award-winning piano trio, Trio Ondine, won the Haydn Competition Vienna, the Parkhouse Award London, Audience Prize in both the ARD competition Munchen and the Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition. The piano trio has performed in concert halls such as: Wigmore Hall, Concerthaus Wien, Pablo Casals Festival. They have also been New Generation Artists for the BBC.

Erik has performed as a soloist with many orchestras and recorded several violin concertos for the Danish label Dacapo. His latest performance together with Lars Anders Tomter and Norrköping Symphony Orchestra was nominated for an American Grammy and was Editor’s Choice in the Gramophone.

Erik was first concertmaster in Copenhagen Phil between 2004-2018 and in the Stavanger Symphony Orchestra between 2017-2020. He continues to be first concertmaster of the Danish National Chamber Orchestra and performs regularly as a guest leader with orchestras across Europe. He has been invited to guest lead orchestras such as the Madrid National Symphony Orchestra, Gulbenkian Orchestra Lisbon, Hamburg Staatsoper, Oslo Opera, Norwegian Radio Orchestra, Oslo Philharmonic amongst others.

Erik is a very dedicated teacher and has in recent years established himself as an exciting, innovative and energetic teacher in Scandinavia. He is a professor and Head of Strings in the University of Stavanger (Norway) and Academy of Music in Malmö (Sweden). In the coming years, Erik will work together with YOMA (Young Musicians Academy in Sweden) where he will teach the talented violinists in Sweden and around Europe between the ages of thirteen and eighteen.

Erik plays a Joseph Guarnerius violin and loves windsurfing.

Born in Aichi prefecture, in a family of musicians with three generations of violinists. Tomio Kondo, the founding concertmaster of the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra, is his grandfather.

After graduating from the Tokyo University of the Arts with the Acanthus Prize, Kondo completed master’s degree at the same university. During his studies, Kondo attended summer courses at the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna, where he studied under members of the Alban Berg Quartet, Amadeus String Quartet and Hagen String Quartets, and got trained in the field of chamber music as well. He took part in the Caravan Concerts in 2002 and 2005 and was trained by Mstislav Rostropovich and Seiji Ozawa. His clear and beautiful tone, and dynamic performance with both delicacy and power have been well received not only in Japan, but also in Italy, Germany, Austria, Spain, Canada, China, Taiwan.

Currently, he is a concertmaster of the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra since 2015, as well as the Future Orchestra Classics (formerly the Nagano Chamber Orchestra) and the Vancouver Metropolitan Orchestra. In addition to his performing career, he serves as a Professor at the University of Tokyo from 2025 and leads the Riverrun String Quartet as the Season Program Producer of the Nagano City Arts Center.

Kondo also teaches at the Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology of the University of Tokyo where he played an essential role in the establishment of the Advanced Art Design Laboratory. Kondo writes a series of essays for the Nishinippon Shimbun called “Golden Notes”. He has also produced a music event, a collaboration of the Karuizawa Music Festival and the Karuizawa New Art Museum, and produced the acclaimed YouTube video content, “Children and the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra played ‘Destiny’ remotely”, which was widely covered by various media as the world's first attempt during the Covid pandemic.

Mira Wang has built a remarkable bridge from her time as a child prodigy in Beijing, China to an acclaimed soloist on the world stage today.

Mira has appeared as a soloist with orchestras all over the world including the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Staatskapelle Dresden, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, Saarbrücken Radio Orchestra, New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, Singapore Symphony Orchestra, Hong Kong Philharmonic and NDR Philharmonic Hannover.

She has premiered many contemporary concertos including the violin concerto Spring in Dresden by Chen Yi with the Staatskapelle Dresden, conducted by Ivan Fischer, John Harbison’s Double Concerto for Violin and Cello with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Carlos Kalmar, the double concerto by Wolfgang Rihm, with Jan Vogler and the Orpheus Camber orchestra at Carnegie Hall. In 2018, She premiered a triple concerto “Alisma” by Swiss composer William Blank with Jan Vogler, Daniel Ottensamer and the Philharmonische Staatsorchester Hamburg, conducted by Kent Nagano at Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg.

Mira has toured the world with famous Hollywood actor Bill Murray, cellist Jan Vogler, and pianist Vanessa Perez in a project called The “New Worlds.” An innovative programme with unexpected and exciting exploration of the relationship between literature and music. A live documentary movie of the show was premiered in movie theaters around the world in the spring of 2022. The recording of “New Worlds” can be found under the Decca Gold label.

Mira has been Artistic Director of the Model Room Musicales concert series in New York City since 2005 and in 2013, she became Director of the Moritzburg Festival Academy in Germany. Mira joined the faculty at Bard Conservatory in 2022.