Jury of the 14th International Henryk Wieniawski Violin Making Competition:
- Roberto Regazzi - Chairman
- Bartosz Bryła
- Andrew Finnigan
- Laura Hamilton
- Ulrich Hinsberger
- Marcin Krupa - Vice-chairman
Please note that the changes in the jury committee are the result of personal and logistical problems related to the COVID pandemic.
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Roberto Regazzi (Bologna, 1956) celebrated in 2020 his 50th year of successful activity as a luthier, started with passion at the early age of fourteen.
After his apprenticeship in Firenze (Wilcox), Parma (Scrollavezza) and Bologna (Bignami) the many experiences and frequent travels of the '70s and the '80s led him to enrich internationally his many interests, knowledge and cultural horizons in violinmaking.
Being involved in a number of projects he has been very active with quality publications, including the first challenging bibliographical pre-internet study about the existing literature relating to musical instrument making, and many other cataloguing efforts or researches to preserve the cultural heritage of this work of Art.
His specialized book collection is considered worldwide a unique piece today, with an organized corpus of thousands items.
Re-elected President of the European Association of Violin and Bow Makers (AEL) in 1998, he has been very active also from a social point of view in a number of national and international professional organizations, lectured extensively and served in the jury of specialized contests.
Many are the relevant personalities of the violin world who appreciated and still play his instruments, including Ruggiero Ricci, Isaac Stern, Franco Gulli, Anne Sophie Mutter, Boris Belkin, Anastasiya Petryshak and many others of the past and present times.
Regazzi takes his best inspiration from classical masterpieces, but particularily from his beloved Bolognese tradition: Giuseppe Fiorini, Ansaldo Poggi, Augusto Pollastri, today synonymous of a very high standard in modern making.
Bartosz Bryła studied with Prof. Adam Nowak from the very beginning of his violin education until his graduation from State Secondary School of Music in Wrocław. He went on to study with Prof. Wolfgang Marschner at the Staatliche Hochschule für Musik in Freiburg, and with Prof. Jadwiga Kaliszewska at I. J. Paderewski Academy of Music in Poznań. Has taken part in music interpretation master classes with Henryk Szeryng, Nathan Milstein and Yehudi Menuhin. Winner of National Young Violin Player Competition in Lublin, prize-winner of International Henryk Wieniawski Violin Competition in Poznań (1981), L. Spohr International Violin Competition in Freiburg, and International Chamber Music Competition in Colmar.
Has performed in Europe, America and Asia, and recorded for Polskie Nagrania, Wifon, Poljazz-Classik, Emscherland Classik, Selene, or EMG Victor. Has made world premiere recordings of Karol Lipiński’s Violin Concerto No. 1 in F sharp minor (with Polish Radio and TV Orchestra in Warsaw conducted by J. Salwarowski), as well as of Józef Wieniawski’s Violin Sonata (with pianist Andrzej Tatarski).
Professor in the class of violin, and head of Chamber Music Dept. at the Academy of Music in Poznań, as well as (since 1998) chair of the class of violin at K. Lipiński Academy of Music in Wrocław. Has conducted master classes at different centres in Europe, America and Asia. Member of the jury at national and international violin, chamber music, and violin-making competitions. Between 2007 and 2015, chairman of Henryk Wieniawski Musical Society of Poznań.
Andrew Finnigan was born in Selby/England in 1966. He received his initial violin-making training at the Newark School of violin-making in England graduating with distinction. After leaving the school, he became self-employed concentrating on the making of new instruments alongside repair and restoration work. After teaching for several years at the Newark School of violin making, he moved to Germany to work with Roger Hargrave, where he concentrated on the making of fine copies of old Italian instruments. At this time, Andrew was one of ten British violin makers selected to have an instrument displayed in the prestigious exhibition '400 Years Of Violin & Bow Making in the British Isles'.
Together with his partner Pia Klaembt, he moved to Bremen where they established a workshop concentrating on the making of fine stringed instruments. while also starting a series of scientific investigations into the acoustics and varnish of stringed instruments which continue to this day. He has written articles for various violin-making journals, his instruments have been featured several times in `The Strad` magazine, and he has given lectures on violin-making and acoustics.
Throughout his career, he has taken part in numerous violin-making competitions, in each case winning an award, culminating in a gold medal in 1999 for violin at the `2e Concours de Lutherie et d`ŕrcheterie` held in Paris and a gold medal for cello at `The Strad Cello and Bow Making Competition` held in Manchester in 2001.
His instruments are played by soloists such as Anne-Sophie Mutter, concert masters, orchestra musicians, and Chamber music players throughout the world.
Since 2016 he has also built children's instruments for 'conTakt-junior e.V.', a nonprofit initiative of European violin- and bow-makers to provide talented children with high-quality instruments and bows.
Laura Hamilton was Principal Associate Concertmaster for the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, where she led hundreds of performances over 33 years. She was concertmaster for many of the Met's popular “Live in HD” videocasts, including Carmen, Parsifal, Turandot, Faust, Salome, and Madama Butterfly. Previously a member of the Chicago Symphony, she appeared there as concerto soloist with Maestro Sir Georg Solti. In 2020 Laura was appointed Interim Artistic Director for the summer festival Classical Tahoe in Nevada, where she is also Concertmaster. She also leads the orchestra and teaches at Festival Napa Valley. She has performed in the Marlboro, Manchester, and Bard Music Festivals, in summer festivals in Norway and Greece, and on the Met Chamber Ensemble series at Carnegie Hall. She appeared as guest concertmaster for the Seattle Symphony, the American Symphony Orchestra, the Welsh National Opera, and the Adelaide Symphony in Australia. In 2014, while on leave from the MET, Laura served for one season as concertmaster at the Sydney Opera House. A highlight of her Sydney experience was a gala concert with famed tenor Jonas Kaufmann; her rendition of Massenet's Meditation from Thaïs garnered rave reviews praising her “radiant,” “serenely beautiful interpretation.”
Born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, Laura is a graduate of Manhattan School of Music, where she was the Nathan Milstein Scholarship recipient. Laura Hamilton teaches violin and chamber music at New York University. She has been visiting faculty at New World Symphony, Manhattan School of Music, and at Bel Canto Institute in Florence, Italy. Her instrument was made in Venice in 1732 by the golden-age luthier, Carlo Tononi. Laura and her husband, cellist Lanny Paykin, reside in Oakland, New Jersey.
Ulrich Hinsberger, born 1967 in Illingen/Saar, received his trainig as violin maker between 1986 and 1990 at the Violin Making School of Mittenwald, Germany, and graduated with merit. Consecutive years as journeyman took him to Munich and Tübingen, involved mostly in the repair and the service of stringed instruments before taking his Masters Degree in Nürnberg 1993.
In 1994, together with his wife Dagmar he founded his own workshop in Winterreute, Germany. In 1997, the workshop moved to Biberach, Ringschnait in Oberschwaben.
Ulrich Hinsberger successfully works on the construction of stringed instruments of the highest quality, as documented by numerous awards at international violin making competitions in Italy, France, China, the UK, USA and Germany. Between 2001 and 2013 he taught violin making and theory at the Violin Making School in Mittenwald.
Ulrich Hinsberger has organized regular meetings, lectures and workshops with the world's leading violin makers, as well as participated in and taught at such renowned workshops as Oberlin.
Born in 1977 in Poznań, Poland, Marcin Krupa graduated from the Violin-Making Dept. at the Academy of Music in Poznań in 2002. Between 2001 and 2002, he completed internship at Gregor Walbrodt’s bow-making workshop in Berlin. Holder of scholarships from the Polish Ministry of Culture and National Heritage (2002 and 2006), he has taken part in numerous international violin making events, at which he was awarded several prizes: Bronze Medal for violin in Cremona (2006); Certificate of Distinction for viola bow in Paris (2004); Silver Medal for violin bow, and Bronze Medal for cello in Mittenwald (2010); Gold Medal for bass bow in Beijing (2013), to name just a few. In 2019, he sat on the jury of 6th Kaminski Violin-Making Competition in Poznań.
Assistant lecturer at Violin-Making Dept. at the Academy of Music in Poznań, Marcin Krupa also runs a family violin- and bow-making workshop (with father Antoni and brother Krzysztof), in which he focuses on making new instruments and bows, as well as maintenance and restoration of the latter.
