The jury 2023
Daniela Vlădescu
Chair of the Jury
Soprano Daniela Vlădescu has performed at the Brașov Musical Theatre, the Romanian Opera House in Bucharest, the Ion Dacian National Operetta Theatre in Bucharest, and is currently on the permanent cast and general manager of the Oleg Danovski Opera and Ballet Theatre in Constanța. With a repertoire spanning the entire history of the opera and operetta genres, Daniela Vlădescu has toured across Romania and abroad, in countries such as Russia, Italy, Bulgaria, China, Germany, Israel, Canada, The Netherlands, Ukraine, Moldova, Hungary, Egypt, and South Korea.
She has been awarded numerous distinctions in recognition for both her performances and entrepreneurial work, including the Operetta International Prize awarded by the International Operetta Association Friuli Giulia in Venice, the certificate of excellence awarded by the Romanian Ministry of Education, and for her work in promoting and preserving the Romance song, she was given the Jubilee Diploma for services to Romanian cultural heritage.
Cristina Popescu-Stănești
Pianist Cristina Popescu-Stăneşti is an alumna of the Bucharest Conservatoire and of Staatliche Hochschule für Musik in Trossingen, Germany, where she studied under Professor Gabriel Amiraș. She performs and records as a soloist and chamber musician across Romania, but also in the UK, Greece, Spain, Germany, the USA, and Italy.
She was an official accompanist at the Sergiu Celibidache and KBS America International Festivals, and the Jeunesses Musicales, Bayreuth, Cluj, and George Enescu International Music Competitions. In 2018 she gave masterclasses to the piano accompaniment students at the Trieste Conservatoire in Italy. She is a lecturer and Dean of the Performance Department of the National Music University in Bucharest.
Andreea Bratu
Pianist Andreea Bratu is an alumna of the National Music University in Bucharest, where she studied with Sandu Sandrin. Between 2002-2004 she attended a postgraduate course at the Giuseppe Verdi Conservatoire in Milan, and benefitted from participating in masterclasses with pianists Paul Badura-Skoda, Helmuth Deutsch, and Roberto Szidon. She has been given numerous awards at international festivals such as Giovanile Trentina – Alto Adige in Italy, MozartWoche – AMI in Italy, and GK Festival – New York.
She was awarded a PhD with Magna cum Laude distinction at the National Music University in Bucharest, and is currently a lecturer in the Arts Department of the Ovid University in Constanța. She has authored various theoretical studies, analects, and critically annotated translations of scholarly works. More recently, she began introducing the piano music of Charles Alkan, Glazunov and Poulenc for the first time in Romania.
Csíky Boldizsár
Csíky Boldizsár is a graduate of the Gheorghe Dima Music Academy in Cluj, where he studied piano with Ileana Prada and Dana Borşan, and composition with Hans Peter Türk. He won several national prizes for his performances, and in 1994 he was awarded the Cella Delavrancea Piano Prize bestowed by pianist Dan Grigore. He attended a postgraduate programme of studies with pianist Jenő Jandó at the Liszt Academy in Budapest, masterclasses in Lübeck with legendary pianist Lev Naumov, and the summer academy in Fontainebleau with Gabi Cassadesus and Philippe Entremont.
He is a soloist in residence with the Münchener Musikseminar, has given over 800 recitals and concerts with all of the symphony orchestras of Romania, and has recorded frequently for radio and television. He gives regular piano masterclasses in Romania and abroad, and is frequently invited to serve on the juries of piano competitions. He is a professor at the Gheorghe Dima Music Academy in Cluj, and in 2006 he obtained his PhD with the thesis ‘Elements of style in the piano works of Scriabin – from late romanticism to modernism’.
Florian Mitrea
Described by Martha Argerich as an ‘oustanding pianist’, Florian Mitrea is a double laureate at the International Piano Competitions in Glagow, Hamamatsu and Munich (ARD). He won the Royal Overseas League Piano Competition, and was a major prize-winner in Harbin (China), Manchester, and Verona. In 2018 he won the top prize at the New York Piano Festival, and subsequently performed at Carnegie Hall. His concert portfolio includes performances at the Usher Hall-Edinburgh, Royal Concert Hall-Glasgow, Bridgewater Hall-Manchester, Queen Elizabeth Hall and Saint-Martin-in-the-Fields in London, the Radio Studios in Munich and the Schwetzingen Festspiele in Germany, the Bozar in Brussels, Bunka Kaikan Hall and Sonic Concert Hall in Tokyo, and the Seoul Arts Centre.
He has performed at the Lucerne, Edinburgh-Fringe, and George Enescu International Festivals, and has been a concerto soloist with the Philharmonia, Collegium Musicum in Basel, the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Bucharest and Iași Philharmonics, and the Romanian Chamber and National Radio Orchestras. He has recorded for the BBC, Südwest Rundfunk, Bayerischer Rundfunk, Radio France Musique, Radio Télévision Suisse and Radio România Muzical. He graduated with the highest distinctions from the Royal Academy of Music in London, where he is currently a piano professor. He studied with Diana Ketler, and later with Boris Petrushansky at the Imola Piano Academy.
Ioan Caruțiu
Ioan Caruțiu is a piano teacher at the Regina Maria National Arts College in Constanța. He graduated from the National Music University in Bucharest, where he studied under Dana Borșan and Toma Popovici. He benefitted from the tuition of some of the most significant musicians in Romania, including pianists Viorica Rădoi, Verona Maier, Cristina Popescu-Stănești and Lavinia Coman. He attended the European seminar for young composers Comporre per coro oggi organised in Italy by the Musical Culture Insititute and the Regional Choral Association in Valle d’Aosta (ARCOVA).
He has performed extensively in Romania, in Constanța at the Ovid University and the King Ferdinand I National Military Museum, in Bucharest at the Nottara Memorial House and the George Enescu Hall of the NMU, in Târgu Mureș at the Palace of Culture, and in Râmnicu Vâlcea at the Art Museum. He was invited to perform in Germany as part of the Junge Talente aus Rumanien concert in Lenggries, the Creaktivum im Brauneck series in Murnau, in the ‘The best of Romania’ series at the Kleiner Konzertsaal of the Gasteig in Munich – an event organised by the Münchener Musikseminar in partnership with the General Consulate of Italy and the Kulturabteilung Instituto di Cultura. In France he has given piano recitals at the Town Hall and Saint Hamon Chapel in Plescop in Brest, and in Italy, in Venice he has performed at the Institute for Cultural and Humanistic Research Palazzo Correr, in Comerio at the concert hall of the Musikseminar, and in Aosta, at the concert hall of the Musical Institute of Aosta.
Petruț Constantinescu
An alumnus of the National Music University in Bucharest, Petruț Constantinescu has been a laureate of several competitions and festivals, both as a soloist and as an accompanist. He sang in the Euphonia Choir of the Ion Dumitrescu Philharmonic in Râmnicu Vâlcea, and with them and the symphony orchestra of the same institution, he has toured across Romania and abroad, both singing and playing the orchestral piano part in some of the greatest works for choir and symphony orchestra.
He was artistic secretary of the Vâlcea Philharmonic between 2001 and 2011, and in 2018 he was awarded the top marks during the selection process to become the general manager of the same institution. His tenure has already yielded notable results both in Romania and abroad, connecting the Vâlcea Philharmonic with other European cultural organisations. He is a founding member of the Romanian Association of Managers of Philharmonic Institutions, a managing body that was formed in 2021 and which has contributed to important cultural projects for the musical institutions of Romania, and a member of the Rotary Club of Râmnicu Vâlcea, with whom he is involved in running educational, social, and cultural projects.
