Arie Van Lysebeth was the President of the Jury of the Queen Elisabeth Competition from 1996 to 2018. He took up the violin at the age of four. He completed his higher education at the Brussels Conservatory in music theory, bassoon, chamber music, and orchestral conducting. Following a competition, he was appointed bassoon soloist of the Belgian Radio and Television Symphony Orchestra. Two years later, he came joint first in the Prague International Bassoon Contest. He also studied conducting under Bruno Maderna in Salzburg and under Pierre Boulez in Switzerland. Starting in 1970, he conducted the Flemish Chamber Orchestra, both in Belgium and abroad. As a guest conductor, he has appeared with the major Belgian orchestras as well as with symphony orchestras in the United States of America, Argentina, Taiwan, the United Kingdom, Italy, and Germany. He has performed with many famous soloists, including Igor Oistrakh, José Van Dam, Murray Perahia, and Augustin Dumay. From 1995 to 2004 he was the regular conductor of the Symphony Orchestra of the Brussels Conservatory, where he taught chamber music for many years (1970-1994) and served as director (1994-2003). From 2004 to 2014, he was the artistic director of the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel.

Diane Andersen, who was taught by Stefan Askenase, also received valuable advice from the Hungarian pianist Annie Fischer. She has a brilliant career as a soloist, chamber musician, and teacher, and gives concerts all over the world in legendary concert halls such as Carnegie Hall, the Rudolfinum, the Concertgebouw, the Brussels Centre for Fine Arts (Palais des Beaux-Arts), and La Fenice; she has worked with eminent conductors such as Bruno Maderna, Pierre Boulez, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Georges Prêtre, and Otto Kamu. She has been awarded a number of distinctions and prizes: International Steinway Artist, the Grand Prix du Disque de l’Académie Charles Cros, the Trophée Fuga (UCB), the Harriet Cohen International Bach Medal, and the Classical Music Award (Midem). Her vast discography includes the complete works of a number of composers (e.g. Jongen and Pierné) and world premieres of works by neglected or unknown composers. She has premiered contemporary works, several of which have been dedicated to her, and her artistic life has been enormously enriched by close contact with illustrious musicians such as Kodály, Tansman, Nono, and Gertler (a partner and friend of Bartók). Diane Andersen is President of EPTA-Belgium Wallonie-Bruxelles and is an emeritus professor at the Royal Brussels Conservatory. She currently runs master classes in North and South America, Canada, Japan, China, Korea, and Europe. She is regularly invited to serve on the juries of international competitions.

Born in Norway, Håkon Austbø made his debut as a soloist at the age of 14. He studied at the Conservatoire National Supérieur and the École Normale de Musique in Paris and later at the Juilliard School in New York, the Hochschule für Musik und Theater in Munich, and in London. After having lived in the Netherlands for more than 30 years, he returned to Norway, while continuing to pursue an eminent career as a soloist and chamber musician in a repertoire ranging from the pre-Classical to contemporary music. He has won a number of awards, particularly in France (Concours International pour la Musique Contemporaine Olivier Messiaen, in 1971) and Norway (including the music critics’ prize in 1989, Musician of the Year in 1992, and the Grieg Prize in 2003). His discography, which includes more than 40 recordings, has also won a number of prizes, including awards for his performances of Skryabin and Messiaen, two of his favourite composers. In Russia, he was chosen to be vice-president of the Skryabin Society. In 1994, he initiated and staged the ‘Luce’ project, which for the first time offered an authentic presentation of the colour element of Skryabin’s symphonic poem Prométhée; the project was premiered in The Hague and performed in a number of countries. Olivier Messiaen considered Håkon Austbø to be the ‘ideal performer’ of his music. Austbø is currently engaged in a research project aimed at presenting colour projections in performances of Messiaen works.

Brilliant and atypical, Frank Braley did not follow the path usually laid down for artists of his calibre. He even strongly insists that he never wanted to become a pianist. He could be described as a dilettante, but one of genius and an obsessive one, too, who gives more than eighty concerts a year. After hesitating between science and music, the self-assured young Braley finally abandoned the university on reaching adulthood and joined the elect in the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique in Paris. Despite his best efforts to end last in the class, the stubborn youngster emerged overqualified and soon found himself propelled onto the international scene following his First Prize in the Queen Elisabeth Competition in 1991. Invited by the great orchestras and laden down with flattering comparisons with the great pianists, Braley didn’t let the praise go to his head. An astute and quick-witted artist, with strong ideas about music, he has lost none of his spontaneous, laid-back relationship with the piano, which combines humour and poetry with modesty, gracefulness, and unshakeable sincerity. Frank Braley, after all, plays for pleasure, whether for the great thrill of a recital or the joy of playing chamber music with friends such as Augustin Dumay, Paul Meyer, Eric Le Sage, Emmanuel Pahud, and the Capuçon brothers.

Interweaving roles as pianist and Sony Award-winning broadcaster with equal aplomb, Iain Burnside is also a master programmer with an instinct for the telling juxtaposition. He has performed in recital with many of the world’s leading singers. His discography of over 50 recordings straddles an exuberantly eclectic repertoire ranging from Beethoven and Schubert to Schoenberg, Copland and beyond, with a special place reserved for the highways and byways of English Song, as acclaimed performances of Britten, Finzi, Ireland, Butterworth, Parry and Vaughan Williams have proved. In 2014, Delphian released Burnside’s complete Rachmaninov songs with seven outstanding Russian artists. For Guildhall School of Music and Drama Burnside has written and devised a number of highly individual theatre pieces. His play A Soldier and a Maker was performed at the Barbican Centre and the Cheltenham Festival, and broadcast on Radio3 as part of the BBC’s World War One season. In demand as a teacher and animateur, Burnside also works at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden and the National Opera Studio. He is International Visiting Artist at the Royal Irish Academy of Music, Dublin.

Since his unprecedented success as joint winner of the 1982 International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, Peter Donohoe has developed a distinguished international career. He is acclaimed as one of the foremost pianists of our time, for his musicianship, stylistic versatility and commanding technique. He has performed with all the major London orchestras, as well as multiple European and American orchestras. He made his eighteenth appearance at the BBC Proms in 2012 and has appeared at many prestigious festivals. Recent and forthcoming engagements include appearances with the Dresden Philharmonic Orchestra, the BBC Concert Orchestra, the Berlin Konzerthaus Orchestra, the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra and CBSO (under Sir Simon Rattle), a UK tour with the Russian State Philharmonic Orchestra, as well as concerts in South America, Europe, Hong Kong, Korea, Russia, and the USA. As well as performing, Donohoe has an impressive catalogue of recordings. Most recently he has recorded a second disc of Prokofiev piano sonatas for SOMM Records, a cd of Shostakovich’s Preludes and Fugues for Signum Records, and a disc of solo piano works by Skryabin. Peter Donohoe is an honorary doctor of music at seven UK universities, and was awarded a CBE for services to classical music in the 2010 New Year’s Honours List.

The Argentinean pianist Nelson Goerner studied at the National Conservatory of Buenos Aires and, after receiving the first prize at the Franz Liszt Competition (1986), he continued his studies with Maria Tipo in Switzerland. In 1990 he won the Geneva Competition. He is a highly demanded musician at festivals such as Verbier, Salzburg, La Roque d’Anthéron, La Folle Journée and the BBC Proms. Orchestras he has worked with include the Philharmonia Orchestra, the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, the NHK Symphony Orchestra Tokyo, the Orchestre de Paris, the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie, and he has worked with several of today’s leading conductors such as Vladimir Ashkenazy, Philippe Herreweghe, Neeme and Paavo Järvi, Sir Mark Elder, Vassily Sinaisky, Jonathan Nott, Fabio Luisi and Esa‑Pekka Salonen. Furthermore, he plays chamber music with internationally recognized musicians such as Martha Argerich, Steven Isserlis, Gary Hoffman, Sol Gabetta and Renaud Capuçon. Nelson Goerner records predominantly for Alpha Classics. Accolades include a Diapason d’Or of the Year, Choc de Classica, Recording of the month of BBC Music Magazine and Editor’s choice of Gramophone. He has a strong relationship with the Mozarteum Argentino in Buenos Aires and enjoys a long association with the Chopin Institute in Warsaw, where he is a member of the artistic advisory committee.

Within more than a decade German born pianist Markus Groh has established himself as one of the most versatile pianists of his generation after having won the 1st prize in the Queen Elisabeth Competition in 1995. His worldwide concert activities include performances with the London Symphony, the Cleveland Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the National Symphony Washington D.C., the San Francisco Symphony, the New Japan Philharmonic, and the St. Petersburg Philharmonic, under such distinguished conductors as Ivan Fischer, Neeme Järvi, Fabio Luisi, Kent Nagano, Jonathan Nott or David Robertson. He performs solo recitals all over the world in some of the most important venues of cities like Amsterdam, Athens, Berlin, Brussels, Frankfurt, London, Munich, New York, Tokyo, Toronto, Vancouver, Vienna, Washington D.C. and Zurich. His first SACD solo recording featured the b minor Sonata, the Fantasy and Fugue on B-A-C-H and the Totentanz of Franz Liszt, and received outstanding reviews in major newspapers (The Times, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, among others) as well as in major music magazines. A second all-Brahms SACD was showered with rave reviews as well. Markus Groh lives in Berlin and New York.

In 1985 Daejin Kim won the Robert Casadesus International Competition (Cleveland) ; he made his debut in New York the following year. Since then, he has performed in recital and with orchestras in the major cities of the United States, Europe, and Asia. In 2006 he was named Professor of the Year by the Music Association of Korea and he was recently decorated as Artist of the Year by the Korean Ministry of Culture. Daejin Kim has been a member of the jury of competitions such as the Ferruccio Busoni, Beethoven (Bonn), Rubinstein and Leeds. After working closely with the Suwon Philharmonic Orchestra as both soloist and conductor, he became its Music Director in 2008. Under his baton, the orchestra made a European tour in Munich, Vienna, Prague and the Merano Festival in 2012. His recordings on the Sony label include two Mozart piano concertos with the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, which he conducted from the keyboard (Sony), and a live recording of the complete cycle of Sibelius Symphonies. Daejin Kim is currently Professor of Piano and Dean of the School of Music at the Korea National University of Arts.

Aleksandar Madžar was born in Belgrade in 1968. He first studied the piano under the guidance of Gordana Malinovic, and later of Arbo Valdma, at the Belgrade Academy of Music. He went on to further studies with Elisso Virsaladze in Moscow and Daniel Blumenthal in Brussels. He is a laureate of several competitions, winning Third Prize at the Leeds International Piano Competition in 1996 and First Prize at the Geneva Competition (1987) and the Ferruccio Busoni (1989) and Umberto Micheli (1997) competitions. He made his debut with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra under Iván Fischer in 1990. Since then, he has performed regularly all over Europe in recital and in chamber music. He also occasionally tours North and South America, South Africa, and the Far East. Aleksandar Madžar teaches at the Royal Brussels Conservatory (Flemish section) and at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg.

Born in Tarbes, France, Cécile Ousset studied under Marcel Ciampi at the Paris Conservatoire, where she won the First Piano Prize at the age of 14. She was a prize-winner at several major international piano competitions, including the Van Cliburn, Queen Elisabeth, Long-Thibaud, and Ferruccio Busoni competitions, before undertaking an international performing career that has taken her to all five continents. She has recorded a vast repertoire, including concertos by Johannes Brahms, Edvard Grieg, Franz Liszt, Felix Mendelssohn, Robert Schumann, Piotr Tchaikovsky, Sergey Rachmaninov, Sergey Prokofiev, Maurice Ravel, and Francis Poulenc, under conductors such as Kurt Masur, Simon Rattle, Günther Herbig, and Neville Marriner. Cécile Ousset gives master classes in the USA, Canada, Europe (including at Puycelsi, France, since 1984), Australia, and the Far East. She frequently serves as a jury member at major competitions such as the Van Cliburn, Rubinstein, Leeds, and Long-Thibaud. In 2011, she was made a Chevalier de l’Ordre National du Mérite.

Born in Seoul, Kun Woo Paik gave his first concert at the age of ten. After graduating from the Juilliard School in New York, he went on to further studies in London under Ilona Kabos and later took courses given by Guido Agosti and Wilhelm Kempf in Italy. In 1969, he won the gold medal at the Ferruccio Busoni International Piano Competition; in 1971, he won the Walter Naumburg Award (New York). He made his European debut in 1974 and has since worked with eminent conductors such as Lorin Maazel, Mariss Jansons, Sir Neville Mariner, Wolfgang Sawallisch, John Nelson, and Paavo Järvi. He has appeared in concert with numerous orchestras, including the New York Philharmonic, the London Symphony, the Orchestre de Paris, the BBC Symphony, the Hungarian National Philharmonic, the Oslo Philharmonic, the Rotterdam Philharmonic, the Warsaw Philharmonic, the English Chamber Orchestra, and the Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della Rai. Contracted exclusively to DECCA, his recordings include transcriptions by Busoni of organ works by J.S. Bach and an album of works by Gabriel Fauré that won a number of awards in France. His interpretation of the complete Prokofiev concertos won a ‘Diapason d’Or de l’Année’ in 1993. Kun Woo Paik lives in Paris. In 2000, he was named a Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres.

After finishing her studies at the Paris Conservatoire, Anne Queffélec went on to study in Vienna with Paul Badura-Skoda, Jörg Demus, and Alfred Brendel. Her successes in the Munich (1968) and Leeds (1969) international competitions paved the way for a remarkable international career as a soloist. Acclaimed in Europe, Japan, Hong Kong, Canada, and the United States, she has had the opportunity to perform with great conductors and with prestigious orchestras such as the London Symphony, the London Philharmonic, the Philharmonia Orchestra, the BBC Symphony, the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, the Tonhalle Zurich, the Polish Chamber Orchestra, the Lausanne Chamber Orchestra, the Orchestre National de France, the Hong Kong Philharmonic, the Kanazawa Ensemble, the Tokyo NHK Symphony Orchestra, and the orchestras of Radio France and Prague. She is a regular guest at renowned festivals worldwide and in France. At La Roque d’Anthéron she performed Mozart’s complete sonatas, broadcast live on France Musique. Under the baton of Sir Neville Mariner she has recorded music for the movie Amadeus. On stage as well as in the recording studio, Anne Queffélec cultivates an eclectic repertoire, ranging from Handel to Dutilleux. She has made more than thirty recordings, for Erato ("Ravel, Debussy, Fauré”), Virgin Classics or Mirare ("Satie & Compagnie”, " Ombre et Lumière").

Elisso Virsaladze attended the conservatory in her native city, Tbilisi (Georgia), before moving to Moscow. At the age of 20 she won the Third Prize in the Tchaikovsky Competition and four years later the First Prize at the Schumann Competition in Zwickau. Ever since, she has been recognised as one of the great interpreters of Schumann. Her heart also goes out to the composers of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, especially Mozart, Beethoven and Chopin. At the same time, the pianist is well known for her wide repertoire up to and including modern Russian composers. Elisso Virsaladze today regularly performs in London, Milan, Rome, Paris, Lisbon, Baltimore, Tokyo and Berlin, both with orchestra and in recital. She regularly performs under renowned conductors such as Rudolf Barschai, Kyril Kondraschin, Mariss Jansons, Ricardo Muti, Kurt Sanderling, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Evgeny Svetlanov and Juri Temirkanov. She teaches at the Moscow Conservatory and at the Munich Musikhochschule and frequently serves as a member of the jury of international competitions, including those in Santander and Munich, the Geza Anda in Zurich, the Rubinstein in Tel Aviv, and the Tchaikovsky in Moscow. Her recordings on the Live Classics label perfectly convey her musical personality.

Born in 1960, Boyan Vodenitcharov entered the Conservatory in Sofia in 1979, having already been a prizewinner at the Senigallia international competition. He went on to come third in the Busoni Competition in 1981 and in the 1983 Queen Elisabeth Competition. He undertook further studies with Leon Fleischer at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore in 1986 and 1987. He gives concerts throughout Europe, the United States, Canada, and Japan, performing at prestigious concert halls such as the Centre for Fine Arts in Brussels, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Palais de la Musique in Strasbourg, the Smetana Hall in Prague, and the Suntory Hall in Tokyo. For 20 years now, he has also taken an interest in period instruments, on which he has recorded a number of CDs. In addition to his activities as a performer, Boyan Vodenitcharov also works in the fields of composition and improvisation. A number of his works have been performed in France, Germany, Belgium, and Bulgaria. He currently teaches the piano, the fortepiano, and improvisation at the Brussels Royal Conservatory.