Neeme Järvi Prize
The Neeme Järvi Prize
The Neeme Järvi Prize – 2025 already awarded for the ninth time – offers active participants at the Gstaad Conducting Academy the special chance of being invited as guest conductor for professional orchestras.
The partner orchestras will invite the respective winners to act as guest conductor in the following season.
Throughout the entire duration of the Gstaad Conducting Academy the active participants will be under the surveillance of the instructors and the festival management. Moreover, representatives of the partner orchestras will be invited to gain an impression of the participating conductors.
Participants selected throughout the entire period will then conduct the GFO in the Gstaad Conducting Academy’s closing concert that takes place on 14 August 2025 in the Gstaad Festival Tent.
Right after the concert, the jury will elect and present the winners of Neeme Järvi Prize 2025. The jury will be composed of the Academy’s professors, Artistic Director Christoph Müller, representatives of the partner orchestras and representatives of the Gstaad Festival Orchestra.
Neeme Järvi Prize 2024 - Final Concert
Alizé Léhon, Omer Ein Zvi, Gabriel Pernet (Photo: Theresa Pewal)
Three prize winners at the 9th Neeme Järvi Prize
By taking part at the Gstaad Conducting Academy, conductors who are among the most talented of their generation were given the unique opportunity to work and give concerts with the internationally renowned Gstaad Festival Orchestra under the direction of outstanding conductors during the past two weeks. For this year’s edition of the Gstaad Conducting Academy, Jaap van Zweden, Music Director of the New York Philharmonic and Johannes Schlaefli, Professor for Orchestral Conducting at the Zurich University of Arts, have once again been engaged.
At the final concert on 14 August 2024, three of this year's ten participants were awarded the Neeme Järvi Prize: Israeli conductor Omer Ein Zvi will be guest conductor of the Berner Symphonieorchester next season. Alizé Léhon will be invited to work with the Musikkollegium Winterthur and the Basel Symphony Orchestra. Swiss conductor Gabriel Pernet will be invited to conduct the Biel Solothurn Symphony Orchestra, the Basel Chamber Orchestra, the Philharmonie Südwestfalen and the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne.
The jury of the Neeme Järvi Prize 2024, chaired by Christoph Müller (Artistic Director of Gstaad Menuhin Festival & Academy), was formed by the professors of the Gstaad Conducting Academy, Jaap van Zweden (in assistance of Peter Biloen) and Johannes Schlaefli, two representatives of the Gstaad Festival Orchestra (Andrey Godik, 1st Oboe and Christopher Jepson, 1st Cellist), as well as representatives of the partner orchestras.
Winners of the Neeme Järvi Prize 2024
Gabriel Perner (CH): Guest conductor of the Sinfonie Orchester Biel Solothurn, Kammerorchester Basel, the Philharmonie Südwestfalen and the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne
Alizé Léhon (FR): Guest conductor of the Musikkollegium Winterthur and the Sinfonieorchester Basel
Omer Ein Zvi (IL): Guest conductor of the Berner Symphonieorchester
Winners of the Neeme Järvi Prize 2023
Aurel Dawidiuk (GE): Guest conductor of the Kammerorchester Basel, Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne and Sinfonie Orchester Biel Solothurn
Anna Sułkowska-Migoń (PL): Guest conductor of the Berner Symphonieorchester, Musikkollegium Winterthur and Sinfonie Orchester Biel Solothurn
Yukuang Jin (CHN): Guest conductor of the Philharmonie Südwestfalen
Winners of the Neeme Järvi Prize 2022
Izabelė Jankauskaitė (LT): Guest conductor of the Berner Symphonieorchester, the Sinfonie Orchester Biel Solothurn, the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne and the Musikkollegium Winterthur
Kyrian Friedenberg (US): Guest Conductor of the Kammerorchester Basel
Samy Rachid (FR): Guest Conductor of the Sinfonie Orchester Biel Solothurn
Daniel Huertas (ES): Guest Conductor of the Philharmonie Südwestfalen
Winners of the Neeme Järvi Prize 2021
Andreas Ottensamer (AUT): Guest conductor of the Sinfonieorchester Basel and Kammerorchester Basel
Andreas Hansson (SWE): Guest Conductor of the Orchestra de Chamber de Lausanne and the Philharmonie Südwestfalen
Jakub Przybcień (PL): Promotion prize, Guest Conductor of the Berner Symphonieorchester and the Sinfonie Orchester Biel Solothurn
Winners of the Neeme Järvi Prize 2019
Teresa Riveiro Böhm (AUT/ESP): Guest conductor of the Kammerorchester Basel
Hankyeol Yoon (KOR): Guest conductor of the Sinfonieorchester Basel
Jonas Bürgin (CH): Promotion prize, Guest Conductor of the Berner Symphonieorchester
Winners of the Neeme Järvi Prize 2018
Andrew Joon Choi (USA): Kammerorchester Basel, Sinfonieorchester Basel, Berner Symphonieorchester
Bar Avni (ISR): Re-Invitation to the Gstaad Conducting Academy 2019
Tabita Berglund (NOR): Re-Invitation to the Gstaad Conducting Academy 2019
Winners of the Neeme Järvi Prize 2017
Petr Popelka (Czech Republic): Kammerorchester Basel, Sinfonieorchester Basel, Berner Symphonieorchester
Katharina Wincor (Austria): Re-Invitation to the Gstaad Conducting Academy 2018
Winner of the Neeme Järvi Prize 2016
Joseph Bastian (Switzerland/France): Kammerorchester Basel, Sinfonieorchester Basel, Musikkollegium Winterthur
Winners of the Neeme Järvi Prize 2015
Nuno Coelho (Portugal): Kammerorchester Basel
François López-Ferrer (USA, Spain): Musikkollegium Winterthur
Toby Thatcher (Australia, UK): Sinfonieorchester Basel