2026 Jury Members
PRESIDENT OF THE JURY
Professor Vanessa Latarche FRCM, Hon ARAM, FTCL, LRAM, ARCM
A world-renowned piano pedagogue and pianist, with many international competition prize-winners amongst her students, Vanessa has been Artistic Director and president of the jury for Hastings International Piano since 2021. She is Head of Keyboard at the Royal College of Music, London, and in September 2011, she was granted a Personal Chair at the RCM, which gave her the title of Chair of International Keyboard Studies. As an extension to her RCM keyboard faculty work,
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Vanessa also holds the position of Associate Director for Partnerships in Asia, which involves managing the RCM’s collaborative work in China and the RCM’s degree programmes at Nangyang Academy of Fine Arts, Singapore. She is the UK’s Artistic Advisor to the Lang Lang International Music Foundation which involves working with gifted children, and she is on the court of the Worshipful Company of Musicians, and a Director of the Eileen Rowe Musical Trust.
Scott Dunn
A noted advocate for American contemporary and film music, Scott Dunn has had a remarkable career as pianist, conductor and orchestrator. He is the Associate Conductor of the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra and regularly appears with major orchestras and headliners throughout the US, UK and Europe.
A one-time student of Byron Janis and former assistant to Lukas Foss, Dunn toured eastern Europe as solo pianist early in his career presenting Ives’ CONCORD SONATA and other American masterworks. He made his momentous Carnegie Hall debut as pianist and orchestrator premiering his own reconstruction of Vernon Duke’s ‘lost’ PIANO CONCERTO in C.
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The newly formed Scott Dunn Orchestra (SDO) is borne from Dunn’s passion for film music, which can be traced back to his mentors Leonard Rosenman and Sir Richard Rodney Bennett. In partnership with The Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts, the SDO – comprised of the world’s greatest studio musicians – celebrates Hollywood’s great music legacy and presents concerts dedicated exclusively to film music as first-rate concert fare.
Scott Dunn is a Steinway Artist.
Jean-Paul Gasparian
Described as “a master” (Le Monde) and “a musician of enormous imagination” (Gramophone), Jean-Paul has already released six albums, the latter of which, Origins, issued by naïve, has been awarded a Diapason d’or. Previous recordings, dedicated to Debussy, Rachmaninoff and Chopin, have been enthusiastically welcomed by the international press.
Winner of the Bremen European Competition 2014, he was awarded the 2020 Thierry-Scherz Prize at the Sommets Musicaux in Gstaad, which offered him the opportunity to record an album with the Bern Symphony Orchestra featuring Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 2 and Arno Babadjanian's Heroic Ballad. He has been nominated at the 2021 Victoires de la musique classique.
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Jean-Paul has played at prestigious venues such as the Teatro San Carlo in Naples, the Tonhalle Zürich, the Philharmonie de Paris, Yokohama's Minato Mirai Hall, Leipzig’s Gewandhaus, and with renowned orchestras such as the Nürnberger Symphoniker, Musikkollegium Winterthur, Belgrade Philharmonic, Armenian State Symphony, Orchestre National d'Île-de-France.
In May 2023, he performed the French Premiere of Howard Shore's Ruin & Memory, in presence of the composer himself, with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio-France.
Born in 1995, Jean-Paul Gasparian studied at Paris National Conservatoire. He obtained an Artist Diploma at the Royal College of Music under the guidance of Prof. Vanessa Latarche. 206 words
Dinara Klinton
After sharing the top prize at the 2006 Busoni Piano Competition at the age of 18, Dinara embarked on a busy international concert schedule, performing at notable festivals such as the “Progetto Martha Argerich” in Lugano and “La Roque d’Antheron.” She has graced many of the world's premier concert venues, including the Royal Albert Hall, Royal Festival Hall, Barbican, and Wigmore Hall in London, as well as Berliner Philharmonie, Konzerthaus, Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Gewandhaus Leipzig, New York's 92Y, and Cleveland Severance Hall. Her concerto engagements feature collaborations with esteemed orchestras like the Philharmonia, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, and Lucerne Symphony Orchestra.
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Dinara balances her performing career with teaching commitments. She has taught at the Royal College of Music and the Yehudi Menuhin School and has been appointed Associate Professor of Piano at the Jacobs School of Music, Indiana University, in August 2024.
As a recording artist, she has garnered widespread critical acclaim, with her album of Liszt’s Études d'exécution transcendante being chosen as Recording of the Month by BBC Music Magazine. Her discography also includes the complete Prokofiev Piano Sonatas.
Dinara began her music education at age five in her native Kharkiv, Ukraine. She graduated with highest honours from the Moscow State Conservatory P.I. Tchaikovsky under Eliso Virsaladze and completed her Master’s degree at the Royal College of Music under Dina Parakhina. 220 words
Juan Lago
Spanish pianist Juan Lago has been awarded in international competitions such as the “Spanish Composers” and ”Cidade de Ferrol” in Spain, or the Concorso Internazionale “Valsesia-Musica”, and Premio Internazionale Pianistico “A. Scriabin” in Italy. He has given masterclasses at renowned institutions including the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz in Cologne and the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester. He is regularly invited as a faculty and performer at many international festivals such as the Washington International Piano Festival (USA), the International Maestro Piano Festival in Taiwan, the Todi International Music Masters in Italy, and the Semaine Internationale de Piano et Musique de Chambre in Blonay, Switzerland.
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Lago teaches at the Conservatorio “José Iturbi” in Valencia and the Escuela Superior Musical Arts in Madrid. He is also the founder and artistic director of the Campillos International Piano Competition, VIPA Festival (Valencia International Performing Arts Summer Festival), and the Malaga International Piano Festival (FIPMA). He has served as a jury member for competitions such as the Cantù and Scriabin in Italy, and the James Mottram in the United Kingdom.
Dr Vivian Sui-Rong Li
Born into a family of artists, Chinese-Canadian pianist Dr. Vivian Sui-Rong Li made her concert debut at the age of five under the tutelage of her father, renowned Chinese pianist Qi Li and supervision of her mother, renowned ballerina Xianping Su, and has now built a career as one of China’s most respected pianists and pedagogies. Vivian completed her undergraduate studies on full scholarship at Oberlin Conservatory with theesteemed French pianist, Monique Duphil, herself a student of the legendary Marguerite Long. Upon graduation, she was awarded Oberlin’s prestigious William R. Abate Outstanding Pianist Award given to the finest pianist of each graduating class.
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She proceeded to finish her studies with Master and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees at the University of Houston under the guidance of Nancy Weems and Horacio Gutierrez, while distinguishing herself in numerous competitions including Canada’s CMC International Stepping Stone Competition, the Grace Welsh International Piano Competition and San Antonio International Competition and in concerts including one performance of Ravel’s G major piano concerto which left the revered pianist Abbey Simon exclaiming, “She played like my friends of the old generation past.”
In 2005, Dr. Li returned to her childhood home of Guangzhou to join the piano faculty of Xinghai Conservatory. Her students routinely go on to study in major conservatories with full scholarships and take top prizes in major international competitions including Youth Gina Bachauer, Cleveland Junior, E-piano Junior, Cooper, Sendai, Aarhus, Ettlingen, Krainev, Beijing Chopin and Zhuhai Mozart. Most recently her longtime student, Hao Rao, became the only Chinese finalist of the 18th Fryderyk Chopin International Piano Competition, gaining international acclaim at the youthful age of 17 and launching an active concert and recording career in the ensuing years.
As a Steinway Artist, Dr. Li maintains an active concert schedule of solo, chamber and concerto performances both in China and abroad. She is also regular guest faculty at Morningside Music Bridge, Todi Music Masters Piano Festival, SIMA Classics and Oberlin Piano Festival, as well as being invited to serve on juries at international competitions such as the Weimar-Bayreuth Liszt, New York Kaufman Youth. 349
Boris Slutsky
Consistently acclaimed for his exquisite tonal beauty and superb artistry, pianist Boris Slutsky has earned top prizes at numerous international competitions. He has performed as soloist with orchestras and as a recitalist and chamber musician across North and South America, Europe, Asia, and South Africa.
An avid chamber musician, Slutsky’s has over three decades of chamber collaborations include the critically acclaimed recording of Schumann’s Sonatas for Violin and Piano with Ilya Kaler on the Naxos label, as well as performances with many renowned artists.
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Slutsky has served as a jury member of many international piano competitions and presented master classes throughout North America, Europe, and Asia. His students have won prizes at numerous prestigious international events.
Born in Moscow, Slutsky received his early training at the Gnessin School for Gifted Children and completed his formal studies at the Juilliard School and Manhattan School of Music. His teachers included Anna Kantor, Nadia Reisenberg, Nina Svetlanova, John Browning, Joseph Seiger, and Alexander Eydeleman.
Slutsky joined the faculty of The Peabody Conservatory of Music in 1993 where he is currently Distinguished Professor of Piano. He has also held visiting faculty positions at Bienen School of Music of Northwestern University, Eastman School of Music, and served as Professor in the Practice of Piano at The Yale School of Music.
Ian Fountain
PRE-SELECTION JURY
Educated as a chorister at New College, Oxford and Winchester College, in 1989 Ian Fountain became the youngest winner of the Arthur Rubinstein Piano Masters Competition in Tel Aviv at the age of 19. He studied piano under Sulamita Aronovsky at the RNCM. Since then, he has enjoyed a wide-ranging and varied career, performing extensively throughout Europe, the USA, the UK and the Far East, with orchestras including the London Symphony under Sir Colin Davis, the Israel Philharmonic with Zubin Mehta, and the Czech Philharmonic under Jiri Belohlavek.
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He has been a piano professor at the Royal Academy of Music, London since 2001. He holds an annual summer masterclass in Cervo, Italy, and others in Beijing, Berlin, Hanover, Budapest and Jerusalem. He has served on the juries of many international piano competitions, including at the Arthur Rubinstein Competition in 2011.
In 2008 he collaborated in the preparation of the present editions of Beethoven Sonatas and Variations for Piano and Cello published by Henle Verlag, Munich. In January 2019, his fingerings for the complete Beethoven Variations for piano were published in the new Henle edition.
In 2022 he became Artistic Director of the International Schubert Piano Competition in Dortmund, Germany.
Carole Presland
Carole Presland has performed worldwide, appearing in the UK at the Wigmore Hall, South Bank and at international festivals including Aldeburgh, Bath, Montpellier, Kronberg and Mecklenberg. She has broadcast regularly for BBC Radio 3 and frequently abroad for Bayerischer Rundfunk, Radio France, Belgian National Radio, RAI TV and in the USA. She has recorded CDs for labels such as Pavane, Meridian and EMI Classics, to wide critical acclaim.
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Passionate about Chamber Music, Carole has collaborated with distinguished artists including Colin Carr, Robert Cohen, Frans Helmerson, Ralph Kirshbaum, Nobuko Imai, Anthony Marwood, Christoph Richter, Scottish Ensemble and the Belcea, Endellion and Chilingirian String Quartets.
A dedicated teacher, Carole was appointed a piano professor at the RNCM in 1996. In 2008 she joined the faculty of the Royal Academy of Music, where she was later awarded an HonARAM. She is currently a piano professor and chamber music coach at Guildhall School of Music & Drama. Frequently invited to give Masterclasses at Conservatoires, Specialist Music Schools and for EPTA, she has also adjudicated for competitions such as BBC Young Musician, Royal OverSeas League, Scottish, and Birmingham International Piano Competitions, amongst many others
