2023 Concerto Competition Winners Announced

The 2023 Stanford Symphony Orchestra Concerto Competition took place Feb. 4 in Dinkelspiel Auditorium. It was epic in length (9 hours), number of participants (33), number of finalists (11), and number of winners: 6! 

Below are the winners of this year's competition, and the works they performed in the competition. Each winner will be featured in an upcoming orchestral program with Stanford Symphony Orchestra (SSO) or Stanford Philharmonia (SP).

• Roger Xia '24, piano — Rachmaninoff: Piano Concerto No. 2
  Roger will perform with SSO on 19 & 20 May 2023.
• Richard Cheung '24, violin — Brahms: Violin Concerto
  Richard will perform with SSO on 1 & 2 Dec. 2023.
• Zachary Lin '26, alto saxophone — Waignein: Rhapsody
  Zachary will perform with SP on 13 May 2023.
• Jenny Xiong '24, flute, and Daniel Sun '25, flute — Doppler: Concerto for Two Flutes in D minor
  Jenny and Daniel will perform with SP on 13 May 2023.
• Laura Futamura '24, flute — Griffes: Poem
  Laura will perform with SP on 11 Nov. 2023.

Congratulations to all of the winners and kudos to all of the participants for their outstanding playing! 

The level of this year's competition was extraordinarily high. The excellent judges were Dr. Andrew Park (Assistant Professor, Piano Studies, Azusa Pacific University) and Eleanor Angel (viola/violin) of Santa Cruz. I am very grateful to them for their expertise and the committed way in which they carefully assessed our students and made their determinations. Also sincere thanks to Lori Lack, Tamami Honma, Weiyi Xu, and the other accompanists for their vital contributions to the competition; to Jewel Hutt and our production team for taking care of pianos and instrument moves; to SunYoung Park for brilliantly carrying out the complicated task of organizing this year's competition; and to all the faculty members who worked hard to prepare students for the competition! — Paul Phillips, Gretchen B. Kimball Director of Orchestral Studies