The Queen Elisabeth Competition (, ) is an international competition for career-starting musicians held in Brussels. The competition is named after Queen Elisabeth of Belgium (1876–1965). It is a competition for classical violinists (since 1937), pianists (since 1938), singers (since 1988) and cellists (since 2017). It also used to hold international competitions for composers from 1953 to 2012. The patron is Queen Mathilde of Belgium.
Since its foundation it has been considered one of the most challenging and prestigious competitions for instrumentalists. In 1957 the Queen Elisabeth Competition was one of the founding members of the World Federation of International Music Competitions.
History Eugène Ysaÿe, Belgian concert violinist, wanted to set up an international music competition for young virtuosi showcasing their all-round skill, but died before he could do so. Queen Elisabeth, patroness of the arts and good friend of Ysaÿe, set up the competition in his memory in 1937. The prestige of Ysaÿe and Belgium's Royal Court (King Albert and Queen Elisabeth were admired heroes of the First World War) assured that the first competition would draw great entrants.
1937–1950 The first two editions of the competition, in 1937 for violin and in 1938 for piano, were named after Ysaÿe. World War II and other impediments prevented the competition from taking place from 1940 to 1950.
1937 1938 Violin X Piano X
1951–1986 In 1951, the competition was renamed for its patroness, Queen Elisabeth, and has taken place under that name since then. It is one of three musical institutions (the others being the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel and Antwerp Symphony Orchestra, residence orchestra of the Queen Elisabeth Hall) dedicated to the former Queen.
Entrants are expected to learn a compulsory work written especially for the competition. (The work is picked during the composition competition.) Usually there is also a section where contestants are expected to perform a work by a Belgian composer. From 1963 to 1980, Marcel Poot of the Brussels Conservatory chaired the jury of the competition and wrote several commissioned works to mark the occasion, that were used as competition-required pieces.
The competition restarted with four-year cycles, starting with two consecutive years for violin and piano respectively, followed by a year for international composition competitions. The fourth year of each cycle had no competition. The years 1973 to 1974 were a transition to cycles with instrument competitions in even years, and the internationional composition competition in the year between the violin and the piano competitions, until the early 1980s when the cycles were re-arranged again. Year Violin Piano Composition 1951 X For Belgian composers 1952 X For Belgian composers 1953 International 1955 X For Belgian composers 1956 X For Belgian composers 1957 International 1959 X For Belgian composers 1960 X For Belgian composers 1961 International 1963 X For Belgian composers 1964 X For Belgian composers 1965 International 1967 X For Belgian composers 1968 X For Belgian composers 1969 International 1971 X For Belgian composers 1972 X For Belgian composers 1975 X For Belgian composers 1976 X For Belgian composers 1977 International 1978 X For Belgian composers 1980 X For Belgian composers 1982 International 1983 X For Belgian composers 1985 X For Belgian composers
1987–2006 With the competition for voice (singing) introduced in 1988 the four-year cycles were piano → voice → violin → year without performer competition. Before 2002 there were no composition competitions in even years.
1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 Piano X X X Voice/singing X X X Violin X X Composition X X X Composition for Belgian composers X X X X X
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 Piano X X Voice/singing X X Violin X X X Composition X X X X X X Composition for Belgian composers X X X X X
2007–2014 From 2007 there were no longer years without competition for performers: with three disciplines (piano, voice, violin), each of these returned in a three-year cycle.
There were competitions for composition in 2008, 2009, 2011 and 2012, each of these for the performance piece of the instrumentalist finale of the next year. 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 Piano X X X Voice X X X Violin X X Composition X X X X
2015 and beyond From 2015 there are again four-year cycles, with, for the first time in 2017, a cello competition added after the year with the piano competition. The public composition competitions stopped. The 2020 competition was postponed to 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025 2026 Violin X X X Piano X X X Cello X X X Voice X X
Patronage and prizes The Queen Elisabeth Competition generates income from its own activities, from private patronage and from sponsoring. Resources are varied: part of the funding for the prizes laureates receive is provided by public authorities and patrons, corporate sponsors, donors contributions, ticket and programme sales, advertising in the programmes and the sale of recordings. The Competition also benefits from the volunteer assistance of families who open their homes to candidates for the duration of the competition.
Prizes for the laureates of the competition (amounts as awarded in the 2015 violin competition): First prize, International Queen Elisabeth Grand Prize – Prize of the patron Queen (as of 2015: Queen Mathilde Prize): 25,000 euro, numerous concerts, recording on CD; for the violin competition also: loan of the 'Huggins' Stradivarius violin from the Nippon Music Foundation until the next violin competition. Second Prize, Belgian Federal Government Prize: 20,000 euro, concerts, recording on CD Third Prize, Count de Launoit Prize: 17,000 euro, concerts Fourth Prize, Prize awarded alternately by each of the communities of Belgium (2015: awarded by the Government of the Federation Wallonia-Brussels): 12,500 euro, concerts Fifth Prize, Brussels Capital Region Prize: 10,000 euro, concerts Sixth Prize, City of Brussels Prize: 8,000 euro, concerts For the other six laureates, sums donated by the Belgian National Lottery: 4,000 euro each
Laureates Competitions for performing musicians have 12 finalists performing as a soloist before a full symphonic orchestra. Originally and until 1993, all finalists became ranked laureates, later only the first six laureates were ranked. The first editions of the competition were dominated by candidates from the USSR: the 1937 violin competition was won by David Oistrakh and the next year Emil Gilels won the piano competition. The piano competition of 1952 and the violin competition of 1955 were the first to see winners from the United States. By the time of the 50th competition in 2012, an increasing number of Asian contestants reached the finals.
Source.
Violin Year 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th 1937 David Oistrakh (Tchaikovsky) Ricardo Odnoposoff Elizabeth Gilels Boris Goldstein Marina Kozolupova Mikhail Fichtengolz 1951 Leonid Kogan (Paganini 1) Mikhail Vayman Elise Cserfalvi Theo Olof Alexei Gorokhov Hedi Gigler 1955 Berl Senofsky (Brahms) Julian Sitkovetsky Pierre Doukan Francine Dorfeuille-Boussinot Victor Pikayzen Alberto Lysy 1959 Jaime Laredo (Sibelius) Albert Markov Joseph Silverstein Vladimir Malinin Boris Kouniev Georgui Mintchev Badev 1963 (Shostakovich 1) Semyon Snitkovsky Arnold Steinhardt Zarius Shikhmurzayeva Charles Castleman Masuko Ushioda 1967 Philippe Hirschhorn (Paganini 1) Stoïka Milanova Gidon Kremer Roman Nodel Hidetaro Suzuki Jean-Jacques Kantorow 1971 Miriam Fried (Sibelius) Andrey Korsakov Hamao Fujiwara Ana Chumachenco Edith Volckaert Joshua Epstein 1976 Mikhaïl Bezverkhny (Saint-Saëns 3) Irina Medvedeva Dong-Suk Kang Grigori Zhislin Shizuka Ishikawa 1980 (Sibelius) Peter Zazofsky Takashi Shimizu Ruriko Tsukahara Mihaela Martin 1985 Hu Nai-yuan (Elgar) Ik-hwan Bae Henry Raudales Hu Kun Mi Kyung Lee 1989 Vadim Repin (Tchaikovsky) Akiko Suwanai Evgeny Bushkov Erez Ofer Ulrike-Anima Mathé 1993 Yayoi Toda (Sibelius) Liviu Prunaru Martin Beaver Natalia Prischepenko 1997 Nikolaj Znaider (Sibelius) Albrecht Breuninger Kristóf Baráti Andrew Haveron Natsumi Tamai 2001 Baiba Skride (Tchaikovsky) Kam Ning Barnabás Kelemen Alina Pogostkin Ning Feng 2005 Sergey Khachatryan (Shostakovich 1) Saeka Matsuyama Mikhail Ovrutsky 2009 Ray Chen (Tchaikovsky) Lorenzo Gatto Ilian Gârnet Suyoen Kim Nikita Borisoglebsky 2012 Andrey Baranov (Shostakovich 1) Tatsuki Narita Hyun Su Shin Esther Yoo Tseng Yu-Chien 2015 Lim Ji-young (Brahms) Oleksii Semenenko William Hagen Tobias Feldmann Stephen Waarts2019Stella Chen (Tchaikovsky)Timothy ChooiStephen KimShannon Lee Júlia Pusker2024Dmytro Udovychenko (Shostakovich 1)Elli ChoiKevin ZhuJulian RheeMinami Yoshida
Piano Year 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th 1938 Emil Gilels Mary Johnstone (Moura Lympany) Jakov Flier Lance Dossor Robert Riefling 1952 Leon Fleisher Karl Engel Maria Tipo Frans Brouw Laurence Davis Lamar Crowson 1956 Vladimir Ashkenazy John Browning Andrzej Czajkowski Cécile Ousset Lazar Berman Tamas Vasary 1960 Malcolm Frager Ronald Turini Lee Luvisi Alice Mitchenko Gábor Gabos Shirley Seguin 1964 Evgeny Mogilevsky Nikolai Petrov Anton Kuerti Richard Syracuse Michael Ponti 1968 Ekaterina Novitskaya Valère Kamychov Jeffrey Siegel Semion Kroutchine François-Joël Thiollier 1972 Valery Afanassiev Jeffrey Swann Joseph Alfidi David Lively Svetlana Navasardyan Ikuyo Kamiya 1975 Mikhaïl Faerman Stanislav Igolinsky Youri Egorov Larry Michael Graham Sergueï Iuchkevitch Olivier Gardon 1978 Abdel Rahman El Bacha Gregory Allen Brigitte Engerer Alan Weiss Douglas Finch Robert Groslot 1983 Wolfgang Manz Boyan Vodenitcharov Daniel Blumenthal Eliane Rodrigues Sergei Edelmann 1987 Andrei Nikolsky Akira Wakabayashi Rolf Plagge Johan Schmidt Ikuyo Nakamichi Mi-Joo Lee 1991 Frank Braley Stephen Prutsman Brian Ganz Hae-sun Paik Alexander Melnikov Igor Ardasev 1995 Laura Mikkola Giovanni Bellucci Yuliya Gorenman Jong Hwa Park Victor Lyadov 1999 Vitaly Samoshko Alexander Ghindin Ning An Shai Wosner Vladimir Sverdlov 2003 Severin von Eckardstein Wen-Yu Shen Unawarded after Dong-Hyek Lim refused it Roberto Giordano Kazumasa Matsumoto Valentina Igoshina 2007 Anna Vinnitskaya Plamena Mangova Francesco Piemontesi Ilya Rashkovsky Lim Hyo-Sun 2010 Denis Kozhukhin Evgeni Bozhanov Hannes Minnaar Yury Favorin Kim Tae-Hyung Da Sol Kim 2013 Boris Giltburg Rémi Geniet Mateusz Borowiak Stanislav Khristenko Zhang Zuo Andrew Tyson 2016 Lukáš Vondráček Henry Kramer Alexander Beyer Chi-Ho Han Aljoša Jurinić Alberto Ferro 2021 Sergei Redkin Keigo Mukawa Tomoki Sakata Vitaly Starikov Dmitry Sin 2025 Nikola Meeuwsen Wataru Hisasue Arthur Hinnewinkel Masaya Kamei Sergey Tanin
Voice / Singing Year 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 1988 Jeanette Thompson Jacob Will 1992 Reginaldo Pinheiro Wendy Hoffman Regina Nathan Cristina Gallardo-Domâs 1996 Eleni Matos Ray Wade 2000 Marie-Nicole Lemieux Marius Brenciu Olga Pasichnyk Pierre-Yves Pruvot 2004 Iwona Sobotka Shadi Torbey Teodora Gheorghiu 2008 Isabelle Druet Anna Kasyan Yury Haradzetski 2011 2014 Sumi Hwang Jodie Devos Yu Shao Hera Hyesang Park 2018 Ao Li Rocío Pérez 2023Taehan KimJasmin WhiteJulia Muzychenko-GreenhalghFloriane HaslerInho Jeong
Cello Year 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th 2017 Victor Julien-Laferrière (Shostakovich 1) Yuya Okamoto Aurélien Pascal Ivan Karizna Brannon Cho 2022 Hayoung Choi (Lutosławski) Yibai Chen Marcel Johannes Kits Oleksiy Shadrin Petar Pejcic Bryan Cheng 2026 Ettore Pagano (Prokofiev Sinfonia Concertante) Tae-Yeon Kim Leland Ko Álvaro Lozano Cames Yo Kitamura Maria Zaitseva
Composition