The second iteration of the Siemens Hallé International Conductors Competition took place in Manchester from Sunday 12th to Tuesday 14th March 2023.

After three days of rounds which included working with the musicians in the Hallé Youth Orchestra and a final performance at The Bridgewater Hall with the Hallé, Euan Shields was announced the winner of the competition. Euan will take up the position of Assistant Conductor from September 2023.

Assistant Conductor Role

The Assistant Conductor role will include a guaranteed number of conducting engagements, with a phased programme of concerts with the Hallé in Manchester and elsewhere over the following 2 years, and with engagements with Orchestras on an international level. They will be an outstanding musician, a confident communicator and a flexible team worker, eager to learn from those around them.

Key tasks of the Assistant Conductor are:

• To shadow the Hallé’s Music Director and visiting conductors, and assist them in matters of balance, off stage conducting, pre-rehearsals, and/or sectionals

•  To conduct a minimum of five public concerts with the Hallé each year

•  To become Music Director of the Hallé Youth Orchestra

•  To direct the Youth Orchestra’s regular weekly term-time rehearsals on Sunday afternoons and public concerts (approximately 4-5 per year) 

•  To lead the Youth Orchestra’s artistic planning process and auditions 

•  To study scores associated with the above, reading all scores of new music sent to the Music Director and Head of Artistic Planning and providing advice on their suitability for performance

•  To sit in on Hallé rehearsals and performances (including touring) in and outside Manchester, and be ready to stand in if appropriate

•  To play a part in the Hallé’s artistic planning team, attending meetings as and when required, and participate in HALLÉ CONNECT education and outreach projects where appropriate

Conductor Euan Shields wins the Siemens Hallé International Conductors Competition 2023

• The conductor came top out of more than 200 candidates from six continents

• The winner will become assistant to Sir Mark Elder CH CBE, Principal Conductor of the Hallé Orchestra, for the next two years, and will take over the directorship of the Hallé Youth Orchestra

• The final was held publicly for the first time in Manchester's Bridgewater Hall, presented by BBC Radio 3’s Tom McKinney

Euan Shields, 24, from the USA/Japan won the seven-strong panel over on the final day with an outstanding display of talent. The second Siemens Hallé International Conductors Competition took place in March 2023 over three days in Manchester, England. More than 200 conductors from six continents had applied to take part, and eight semi-finalists were selected for the competition days. Of these eight, three candidates made it into the final on March 14. Here in The Bridgewater Hall, they guided the Hallé through four works by Mozart, Elgar, Sibelius and Stravinsky. For the first time the final, presented by BBC Radio 3’s Tom McKinney, was a public event at which the finalists were put through their paces in front of an international audience. In a live optional voting session, the audience members separately chose their favourites. Please note, the winner of the competition was selected entirely at the discretion of the panel.

About the winner

Euan Shields said: It's been a very intense few days of lots of music making and all of this is still resonating in my head. I'm so excited to get to know the entire family of the Hallé Orchestra and to learn as much as possible from the musicians of the Hallé and I'm also very excited to take the Hallé Youth Orchestra on a really exciting musical journey over the course of two years.

About the competition

The first prize of the Conductors Competition consists of a two-year engagement as assistant conductor to Sir Mark Elder, Music Director of the Hallé. In addition, the winner will take over the directorship of the Hallé Youth Orchestra and will receive the opportunity to become established on the world stage through numerous guest conducting appearances. Euan will take up his new position with the Hallé in September 2023.

Sir Mark Elder said: It has been an enthralling three days and a privilege to observe such wonderful talent. Choosing the winner was very difficult, but I am delighted to welcome Euan Shields as the new Assistant Conductor of the Hallé, and look forward to working with him.

Stephan Frucht, Artistic Director of the Siemens Arts Program said: The Hallé Orchestra is a great cultural institution with a great influence on the music scene. The Conductors Competition of the Siemens Arts Program, especially in association with the Hallé Orchestra, therefore offers young talents the ideal start to a promising career. For Delyana Lazarova, the first prize winner of the Siemens Hallé International Conductors Competition in 2020, her win has brought her a real career leap and she has since conducted orchestras all over the world.

Alongside Stephan Frucht and Sir Mark Elder, the competition panel comprises further prestigious, internationally established experts from the music world: David Butcher (Chief Executive of the Hallé), Anna Hirst (Head of Artistic Planning at the Hallé), Angela Dixon (Chief Executive of Saffron Hall), Sergey Smbatyan (Principal Conductor of the Armenian State Symphony Orchestra and the Malta Philharmonic Orchestra) and Carola Reul (Managing Director of the Junge Deutsche Philharmonie).

The competition builds on a long-standing partnership between the Hallé and Siemens AG. As well as fostering excellence among talented young musicians as part of the Siemens Arts Program, the two organizations collaborate closely on delivering a variety of educational and community outreach projects.

Audience vote

The winner of the audience vote was Agata Zając.

We are delighted to announce that the three candidates in the finals taking place on 14 March 2023 at The Bridgewater Hall are Pablo Urbina, Euan Shields and Agata Zając.

Our heartfelt thanks to all of our wonderful semi-finalists who have made the competition so engaging. 

The Hallé is delighted to announce that over 200 applications for the Siemens Hallé International Conductors Competition were received, from six continents! These have now been shortlisted to just eight. Over the coming weeks these eight will be reduced to just three finalists. These three continue through the process that culminates in the public final and the announcement of the winner on Tuesday 14th March 2023 in Manchester’s Bridgewater Hall.

The eight shortlisted candidates are:

Otis Enokido-Lineham, 27
UK

Otis Enokido-Lineham is a British/Japanese conductor, born and currently living in London. For the 22/23 season he is one of the assistant conductors for the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and on the NEXT programme with BCMG. This season he works with a variety of ensembles such as BBCNOW, the National Children’s Orchestra, Britten-Pears Contemporary Ensemble, BCMG and Purcell School Symphony Orchestra at the Southbank Centre. Otis has attended masterclasses with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and Campos dõ Jordao Festival and worked with conductors including John Wilson, Ryan Bancroft, Ludovic Morlot and Alice Farnham. He studied cello at the RNCM before completing his Masters in Orchestral Conducting at the Royal Academy of Music with Sian Edwards. 

Chloé Meyzie, 37
France

French-born conductor Chloé Meyzie is a dynamic and versatile young artist guided by passion and rigor. At the dawn of her career, Chloé recently won the competition for the position of the music director of the Ensemble Instrumental de la Mayenne. Known for her energy and her ability to lead the orchestra with a clear and bright vision, Chloé is involved in major projects. In early 2021, she supervised the creation of the Labopéra Périgord-Dordogne. This collaborative opera company is part of the national network of La Fabrique Opéra. After conducting Carmen by Bizet in 2022 – a project that has been seen by an audience of 7.000 people –, she will conduct La Traviata by Verdi in 2023.

Abner Padrino, 30
Venezuela

At the age of seventeen he began his studies in orchestral conducting with maestro José Antonio Abreu. In 2011 he made his debut conducting the Ezequiel Zamora Youth Orchestra. In 2018 he made his debut conducting the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra of Venezuela. Since then, Padrino has become a frequent guest conductor on regular programming. He participated in the German Director's Award in 2021 held in Cologne conducting the Gürzenich Orchester Köln and the WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln. In May 2022, he participated by competition in the master classes given by maestro Cristian Măcelaru, conducting the Romanian Chamber Orchestra in Timișoara, Romania.

Charlotte Politi, 32
Italy

Charlotte Politi is currently the Constant Lambert Conducting Fellow with The Royal Ballet and Birmingham Royal Ballet. For the 2022/2023 Season, she is one of the assistant conductors of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. In 2020 she was selected by Riccardo Muti for the Italian Opera Academy and in 2021 she was one of the participants at the Conductors’ Academy of the Tonhalle Zürich, under the guidance of Paavo Järvi.

Euan Shields, 24
USA

Euan Shields is a conductor aspiring to share the joy of music through his work. He is pursuing a Master of Music in Orchestral Conducting at the Juilliard School under the guidance of David Robertson. Amongst the orchestras with which Euan has appeared are the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo, the Juilliard Lab Orchestra, Juilliard’s AXIOM Ensemble, and the South Denmark Philharmonic. Recently Euan has worked as the assistant and cover conductor for John Adams, Giancarlo Guerrero, Jonathon Heyward, Xian Zhang, and Jeffrey Milarsky.

Konstantinos Terzakis, 27
Greece

Appointed Assistant Conductor of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra (2022/23) and selected conductor at the Klangspuren Schwaz Festival 2021 (Austria) under the International Ensemble Modern Academy, Konstantinos Terzakis has been based in the United Kingdom since 2019 where he has bolstered his education in conducting and collaborated professionally with a diverse range of ensembles and orchestras. He completed his Master's of Music in orchestral conducting with Martyn Brabbins, Garry Walker and Alasdair Mitchell, having been awarded a full scholarship by the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.

Pablo Urbina, 34
Spain

Pablo Urbina, is a Spanish conductor, since 2019 the Principal Conductor of London Orchestra Vitae. With a strong focus on music outreach, Pablo is an Ambassador of The Amber Trust UK. 22-23 highlights include his returns with the Spanish National Radio Orchestra, Balearic Symphony Orchestra and Opera Tenerife, and debut with Waco Symphony in Texas (USA). Pablo has also conducted orchestras including the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, City Chamber Orchestra of Hong Kong and Castilla y Leon Symphony Orchestra, and has worked with conductors such as Leonard Slatkin, Bernard Haitink and Lionel Bringuier.

Agata Zając, 27
Poland

Agata is a former Resident Conductor of the Toruń Symphony Orchestra and the Sudeten Philharmonic Orchestra. She has debuted internationally most recently in Musikverein Graz and Orchestre national de Metz. In 2018-2020 she collaborated with Warsaw Chamber Opera, Malta Philharmonic Orchestra, Greek National Radio Orchestra and Athens Philharmonia Orchestra as Assistant Conductor. Currently, she holds the Mills Williams Junior Fellowship in Conducting at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester and is a D.A. student at the Academy of Music in Kraków.

Schedule

Applications Open

Friday 29th April 2022 at 13:00 GMT

Applications Close

Thursday 8th September 2022 at 13:00 GMT

Semi-Finalists Announced

Applicants informed November 2022

Public announcement December 2022

Semi-Finals with the Hallé Youth Orchestra

Sunday 12th March 2023

Chamber Ensemble Day at Hallé St. Peters

Monday 13th March 2023

Finalists Announced

Monday 13th March 2023

Interviews and Finals

Tuesday 14th March 2023

with the Hallé Orchestra in a public concert at The Bridgewater Hall, following which the Winner of the Competition will be announced.

Each of the finalists will prepare all of the repertoire listed below. On the day, they will each conduct The Marriage of Figaro Overture and one of the other symphonic works.

Mozart The Marriage of Figaro Overture
Elgar Enigma Variations
Sibelius Symphony No.3
Stravinsky Firebird Suite 1945

9.25pm programme finished and deliberations commence
10pm presentations and announcement of the winner
10.20pm finish

Angela Dixon

Angela studied music at London University and then worked in market research for the car industry for two years.  Realising cars were of no interest to her, she sought a job in classical music.  From 1993 she worked in orchestral touring for both Harold Holt and Van Walsum Management and in 1999 started working at the Barbican Centre, as classical music programmer.  She programmed many concerts and festivals and commissioned numerous works on behalf of the Barbican. In 2007 her festival ‘Traced Overhead: the music of Thomas Adès’ won a South Bank Show award. In 2011 Angela became Head of Music at the Barbican, leading the music department's contribution to the London 2012 cultural Olympiad and the opening of Milton Court at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.

In April 2014 she became Chief Executive of Saffron Hall, a 740 seat concert hall based at a comprehensive school in North Essex, and won the ABO/Rheingold Concert Hall Manager of the year in 2016.  She has established the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Britten Sinfonia as Resident Orchestras and established a world-class programme of classical, jazz, world and folk music; a dance and talks programme and a sustained programme of work with amateur groups.  Saffron Hall also runs an extensive programme of work with schools and communities throughout the region. Angela is a trustee of YCAT, a trustee of the Royal Philharmonic Society and a board member of the British Association of Concert Halls. Since 2008 Angela has worked for composer Thomas Adès, managing his performing work.

Anna Hirst

Anna has been Head of Artistic Planning for the Hallé since September 2020 in which time she has helped the Orchestra navigate the challenges of the pandemic; initially programming a digital only season which was viewed worldwide, before welcoming live audiences back to The Bridgewater Hall and returning the Orchestra to concert halls around the UK.
Prior to joining the Halle, Anna spent more than 10 years as an active member of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra’s artistic planning team. Highlights included the 50th anniversary performance of Britten War Requiem in Coventry Cathedral, touring the orchestra to venues around the UK and delivering the CBSO’s centenary celebration concert which was viewed more than 150,000 times, world wide.
Over the years, Anna has enjoyed working with numerous fantastic conductors including Andris Nelsons, Sir Simon Rattle, Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla, Kazuki Yamada and Sir Mark Elder.

Anna was brought up in Hampshire where she was exposed to music from a young age. She went on to become a member of Hampshire Youth Orchestra and Youth Choir which lead to her studying the flute at Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama, graduating in 2007.

Sergey Smbatyan

Armenian conductor Sergey Smbatyan is the Founding Artistic Director and Principal Conductor of the Armenian State Symphony Orchestra and Principal Conductor of the Malta Philharmonic Orchestra.

The Armenian State Symphony Orchestra is a symphony orchestra performing internationally to great acclaim. Under Smbatyan’s artistic direction, its players are energetic, enthusiastic musicians with the shared objective of raising cultural awareness in Armenia and pursuing spiritual excellence through classical music.

Smbatyan has presented the Armenian State Symphony Orchestra and the Malta Philharmonic throughout Europe, Russia and the United States. Performances include Vienna’s Musikverein, the Berlin Philharmonie, Salzburg’s Großes Festspielhaus, London’s Barbican Centre, the Gasteig Munich, Rudolfinum in Prague, Grand Hall of the Moscow State Conservatory and New York’s Carnegie Hall where he made his debut at the age of 28.

The 2022-23 highlight includes touring with the Roumanian National Philharmonic Orchestra in the United Kingdom in a series of venues including Cadogan Hall, London; Usher Hall, Edinburgh;  Bridgewater Hall, Manchester; Royal Concert Hall, Nottingham.

It is significant to note that Smbatyan will appear again in the same halls within the same season already with the Armenian State Symphony Orchestra.

Born in Yerevan, Smbatyan was first introduced to music by his grandmother, the violinist and teacher Tatyana Hayrapetyan, who gave him violin lessons from an early age. He later studied at the Komitas State Conservatory of Yerevan and the Moscow P.I. Tchaikovsky Conservatory, receiving lessons from Bagrat Vardanyan and Zakhar Bron. Whilst studying for a PhD in Fine Arts in Yerevan with Yuri Davtyan, Smbatyan developed his passion and conducting skills working with the Armenian State Symphony Orchestra which he founded aged 18. As a conductor, Smbatyan has been significantly influenced by his lessons with Riccardo Muti and Sir Colin Davis which he undertook during his studies at the Royal Academy of Music in London.

A winner of multiple European conducting and violin competitions, Smbatyan has developed an international reputation that includes guest conducting engagements at the Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, Philharmonia Orchestra, Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Russian National Orchestra, Dresden Philharmonic, Sinfonia Varsovia, and many others.

In 2015, Smbatyan became the youngest recipient of the Chevalier of the Order of Arts and Letters. He was presented with the award by the French Minister of Culture attended by Krzysztof Penderecki and Charles Aznavour, among other guests of honour. Two years later, as commendation for his promotion of Armenian music and culture, the President of the Republic of Armenia presented Smbatyan with the title of Honoured Artist of the Republic of Armenia. 

Smbatyan’s championing and commissioning living composers, promoting cultural heritage and developing new audiences are central to his artistic life and are reflected in his work as the Founder and Artistic Director of the Armenian Composing Art Festival; the Penderecki Contemporary Classics' Festival; the “Armenia” International Music Festival; the Khachaturian International Festival. The latter has its distinct positioning in Smbatyan’s cultural activities as a calling card for the Armenian performing arts. These values also define his work as Artistic Director of the Khachaturian International Competition.

Carola Reul

Carola Reul is Managing Director of the Junge Deutsche Philharmonie, an orchestra that prepares selected top students from German-speaking music conservatoires aged 18 to 28 for their careers as professional orchestra musicians.

Carola Reul studied music at the University of Würzburg, trained as a music teacher for secondary education and completed a Postgraduate Diploma in Cultural Management at City University, London. During her time at City University she worked as an intern at the BBC Symphony Orchestra. She held positions in both the Artist and Touring Departments at the classical music agency Harrison Parrott UK, before moving to KD Schmid in 2007 where she served as Senior Project Manager at the Orchestral Department. In this role she continued the long-standing relationship between the Hallé Orchestra and KD Schmid with her touring activities for the orchestra.

During her years in London, she was a permanent member of the BBC Symphony Chorus and completed several actors’ training courses at Morley College. From 2012 until the end of 2018 she served as an elected board member of the International Artist Managers’ Association (IAMA). In addition to her work as Managing Director of the Junge Deutsche Philharmonie, she also served as a jury member of the previous Siemens Hallé International Conducting Competition as well as the Sir Georg Solti International Conductors' Competition 2020.