The Winners of the MIDEM Classical Awards 2010

CANNES, France, Jan. 27 /PRNewswire/ -- Broadcast live for the first time on the France Musique radio station, MIDEM's showcase classical evening – the MIDEM Classical Awards – took place last night in the Debussy Auditorium at the Palais des Festivals in Cannes. The sixth edition, hosted by the British journalist James Jolly and the Canadian contralto Marie-Nicole Lemieux, saw awards going to 16 discs and three DVDs, chosen from 111 entries from international labels from 20 countries.

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Frederic Chopin and his native Poland were honoured to mark the bicentenary of the composer's birth with a live performance by the Sinfonietta Cracovia orchestra conducted by John Axelrod and the teenage prodigy pianist Jan Lisiecki, who brought the evening to a close with his brilliant and poetic interpretation of Chopin's Concerto No 1 for Piano in E minor. The jury of the MIDEM Classical Awards gave two special Chopin prizes, in collaboration with the Fryderyk Chopin Institute. The Special Chopin Award– Best Ever was attributed to EMI's recording of Chopin's waltzes by Dinu Lipatti, while the Special Chopin Award – New Recordings went to Nikolai Demidenko for his disc of the composer's preludes, released by Onyx.

Another high-point of the MIDEM Classical Awards was the moving tribute to the Italian soprano Mirella Freni, whose dazzling career follows in the footsteps of the great cantatrices like Maria Callas and Christa Ludwig. The audience showed their appreciation with a rousing standing ovation as she received the Lifetime Achievement award from Paul Zilk, Chairman and CEO of Reed MIDEM.

The young clarinettist Jose Franch Ballester, voted revelation of the year, performed a magisterial Rhapsody for Clarinet and Orchestra by Claude Debussy. The Latvian mezzo-soprano Elina Garanca and the German baritone Christian Gerhaher, voted respectively Female and Male Vocalist Artist of the Year, enchanted the audience with their interpretations of La Habanera by Georges Bizet and Gustav Mahler's lied Ich hab' ein gluhend Messer.

Another great voice resonated last night on stage at the Palais des Festivals, as contralto Marie-Nicole Lemieux gave her rendition of the beautiful Chanson Triste by Henri Duparc. The celebrated King Singers, who won the DVD Concert award for their "Live at the BBC Proms" on Signum Records, interpreted Recipe of Love by Harry Connick Jr.

The MIDEM Classical Awards also bestowed prizes on some of the great figures of the classical music scene, including the conductors Bernhard Kontharsky, Jonathan Nott and Sylvain Cambreling, the pianist Ronald Brautigam, the viol player Jordi Savall, the sopranos Montserrat Figuerras and Sandrine Piau, the quartet Ebene, and Patrick Zelnik, founder and head of naïve, voted label of the year.

The sixth edition of the MIDEM Classical Awards, one of the highlights of the 44th MIDEM global music market, was once again distinguished by its dazzling artistic line-up and its prestigious list of award-winners.

The winners of the MIDEM Classical Awards 2010

EARLY MUSIC

Jerusalem, La Ville des deux Paix - La Paix Celeste et la Paix Terrestre

Montserrat Figueras, La Capella Reial de Catalunya, Al-Darwish, Hesperion XXI, Jordi Savall

Alia Vox

BAROQUE MUSIC

Telemann - Brockes-Passion

Birgitte Christensen, Lydia Teuscher, Marie-Claude Chappuis, Daniel Behle, Donat Havar, Johannes Weisser, RIAS Kammerchor, Akademie fur Alte Musik Berlin, Rene Jacobs

Harmonia Mundi

VOCAL RECITALS

Handel - Between Heaven & Earth

Sandrine Piau, Accademia Bizantina, Stefano Montanari

Naive

CHORAL WORKS

Zimmermann - Requiem for a Young Poet

Claudia Barainsky, David Pittman-Jennings, Lutz Lansemann, Michael Rotschopf, Jan Hage, Joao Rafael (Live Electronics), Czech Philharmonic Choir Brno, Slovac Philharmonic Choir, EuropaChorAkademie, Eric Vloeimans Quintet, Holland Symfonia, Bernhard Kontarsky

Cybele

OPERA

Shostakovich - The Nose

Vladislav Sulimsky, Alexei Tanovitski, Tatiana Kravtsova, Andrei Popov, Sergei Semishkur, Mariinsky Orchestra and Chorus, Valery Gergiev

Mariinsky

SOLO INSTRUMENT

Paganini - 24 Capricci

Thomas Zehetmair

ECM

CHAMBER MUSIC

Ravel, Debussy, Faure - String Quartets

Quatuor Ebene

Virgin Classics

CONCERTOS

Beethoven - Piano Concertos WoO4 & No. 2

Ronald Brautigam, Norrkoping Symphony Orchestra, Andrew Parrott

BIS

SYMPHONIC WORKS

Mahler - Symphony No. 9

Bamberger Symphoniker, Jonathan Nott

Tudor

CONTEMPORARY MUSIC

Messiaen - The Works for Orchestra

Roger Muraro, Yvonne Naef, EuropaChorAkademie, SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden und Freiburg, Sylvain Cambreling

Hanssler Classic

FIRST RECORDING

Rigel - Symphonies

Concerto Koln

Berlin Classics

HISTORICAL

Friedrich Gulda - The Early Recordings

Friedrich Gulda, Klavier, RIAS-Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Igor Markevitch

Audite

DVD: OPERA / BALLET

Tchaikovsky - Eugene Onegin

Mariusz Kwiecien, Tatiana Monogarova, Margarita Mamsirova, Andrey Dunaev, Anatolij Kotscherga, The Bolshoi Theatre Soloists, Chorus & Orchestra, Dmitri Tcherniakov, Chloe Perlemutter, Alexander Vedernikov

Bel Air Classiques

DVD: CONCERTS

The King's Singers Live at the BBC Proms

Signum Records

DVD: DOCUMENTARIES

Sergiu Celibidache - You don't do anything - You let it evolve

A film by Jan Schmidt-Garre

Arthaus Musik

CLASSICAL DOWNLOAD

Classicsonline.com

OUTSTANDING YOUNG ARTIST (in cooperation with IAMA)

Jose Franch- Ballester

JURY NOMINATION

Bach- 6 solos

Sonatas & Partitas

Viktoria Mullova

Onyx

ARTIST OF THE YEAR – INSTRUMENTALIST

Angela Hewitt *

Piano (Canada)

ARTIST OF THE YEAR – FEMALE VOCALIST

Elina Garanca *

Mezzo soprano (Latvia)

ARTIST OF THE YEAR – MALE VOCALIST

Christian Gerhaher *

Baritone (Germany)

LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT

Mirella Freni *

Soprano (Italy)

LABEL OF THE YEAR

Naive Classique (France) *

RECORDING OF THE YEAR

Zimmermann - Requiem for a Young Poet

Claudia Barainsky, David Pittman-Jennings, Lutz Lansemann, Michael Rotschopf, Jan Hage, Joao Rafael (Live Electronics), Czech Philharmonic Choir Brno, Slovac Philharmonic Choir, EuropaChorAkademie, Eric Vloeimans Quintet, Holland Symfonia, Bernhard Kontarsky

Cybele

SPECIAL CHOPIN AWARD – BEST EVER

(in cooperation with the National Chopin Institute Warsaw)

Frederic Chopin: 14 Waltzes, Barcarolle, Nocturne in D flat, Mazurka in C sharp minor

Dinu Lipatti, piano

EMI/Angel

SPECIAL CHOPIN AWARD – NEW RECORDING

(in cooperation with the National Chopin Institute Warsaw)

Frederic Chopin: 24 Preludes op. 28, Sonata No.3 in B minor, op.58

Nikolai Demidenko, piano

ONYX

Note to the editors:

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