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2009 Winners

Samuel Oram

Born and raised in the greater Boston area, Samuel Oram gave his first recital of the complete Book I of Debussy Preludes in Harvard University at the age of 13. Quickly becoming known for his penchant for diverse and complex repertoire, he was invited to make his orchestral debut at the age of 15, performing in Jordan Hall under Benjamin Zander’s baton. Since then, Oram has won accolades throughout the United States and abroad, having recently made his China debut performing a concert in the National Shenyang Opera House, for which he was granted a “Special Award from the Liao Ning Province Festival as an Outstanding Performer.” His awards include first prize in the Corpus Christi International Competition for Piano and Strings in 2009, first prize in the Steinway Society of Western Pennsylvania Piano Competition of 2008, and second prize in the Kankakee Concerto Competition of 2004. He has also been invited to perform with numerous orchestras, most notably the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra under George Del Gobbo and the Carnegie Mellon Philharmonic under Juan-Pablo Izquierdo and Steven Smith. His teachers have been Ursula Oppens, Enrique Graf, Shou Ping Liu, and Tamas Ungar; he has also received coaching in the master classes of Leon Fleischer, Anthony di Bonaventura, Yakov Kasman, Emma Tahmiziàn, and Menachem Pressler. He is currently starting his Doctoral degree at West Virginia University on full scholarship in the studio of Dr. Peter Amstutz. Oram performs regularly throughout the United States in solo appearances as well as duo concerts with his wife, the pianist Shou Ping Liu. Upcoming engagements include a duo recital in Washington D.C.’s American University that they will present in January, 2010 as part of the OLLI lecture series.

Benjamin Beilman

A winner of Astral’s 2009 National Auditions, violinist Benjamin Beilman was also awarded the MILKA/ASTRAL VIOLIN PRIZE, designated for a violinist invited to join the Astral Artists roster. Mr. Beilman is a 2007 Presidential Scholar in the Arts and the recipient of a Gold award in Music from the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts, which presented him in performances at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts as well as in New York City’s Ziegfeld Theatre. He has also performed in Carnegie Hall as a member of the New York String Orchestra, under Jaime Laredo.

Only 19, Mr. Beilman has already garnered numerous competition prizes. He is the First Prize winner of both the 2009 Schmidbauer Competition and the 2009 Corpus Christi International Competition (where he was also awarded the special Bach prize), and, as the Grand Prize winner of the American String Teachers’ Association national solo competition, he made his debut with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra in September 2008. He was the recipient of the Gold Medal at the Stulberg International String Competition, and was awarded First Prize in competitions sponsored by the Music Teachers National Association, the Society of American Musicians, and Midwest Young Artists, among others. Other awards include top prizes at the Johansen International Competition, the National Society of Arts and Letters Violin Competition, and the Blount-Slawson Young Artist Competition.

Mr. Beilman has performed with the Ft. Collins, Toledo, Dearborn, and Birmingham-Bloomfield symphonies as the winner of their respective young artists competitions, and has appeared as guest soloist with the Ann Arbor Symphony, the Kalamazoo Symphony, and the RAI National Symphony in Turin, Italy. Other solo appearances in the 2008-2009 season include a return engagement with the Dearborn Symphony, as well as performances with the Cayuga Chamber Orchestra and the Chamber Orchestra of the Triangle.

A featured artist at the Marlboro Music Festival and the Verbier Festival Academy in Switzerland, Mr. Beilman has also appeared on National Public Radio’s “From the Top” program, the McGraw-Hill Young Artists Showcase on WQXR New York Radio, and in The Juilliard School’s Starling-DeLay Symposium. Benjamin Beilman began playing the violin at age five. He graduated with honors from Community High School in Ann Arbor, Michigan and currently studies with Ida Kavafian at The Curtis Institute of Music.