In its twentieth year of assisting young conductors on the threshold of substantial careers, the Solti Foundation U.S. has announced that the 2020 recipient of The Sir Georg Solti Conducting Award is Knoxville Symphony Orchestra music director Aram Demirjian. The announcement was made remotely by Foundation Board Chair Penny Van Horn, and Elizabeth Buccheri, Artistic and Awards Committee Chair. The prestigious award comes with a $30,000 grant which may be used by Demirjian in career advancement in various ways, including language study, purchases of scores, or travel.
“We have observed Aram’s growth as a conductor over the past several years,” said Van Horn, “first awarding him a Career Assistance Award in 2017, and are pleased to now award him with The Solti Fellow. He has grown steadily in his craft and is innovative in his approach to classical music.”
Demirjian was also the recipient of the 2019 Solti Foundation U.S. Career Assistance Award, a 2018 Solti Foundation U.S. Opera Residency with Lyric Opera of Chicago (for Massenet’s Cendrillon, assisting Sir Andrew Davis), and the 2011 Robert J. Harth Conducting Prize from the Aspen Music Festival, where he was a three-time Conducting Fellow in the Aspen Conducting Academy.
KSO Board President Bill Riley offered: “The Knoxville Symphony family is so incredibly proud of Aram with this very prestigious award. We know firsthand his talent and creativity and are very thankful to have been the beneficiaries of both during the last four years. We congratulate Aram on his recognition and look forward to his continued success.”
Demirjian is completing his fourth season with the KSO, debuting with the orchestra in September 2016. The truncated 2019-20 season, now sporting the dreaded asterisk, was to have included a March participation in SHIFT: A Festival of American Orchestras, presented by the Kennedy Center and Washington Performing Arts.
Arts Knoxville coverage of Maestro Demirjian’s performances with the KSO can be found here.
