Mayumi Kanagawa

Mayumi Kanagawa is a Berlin based, Japanese-American violinist praised for her rich, dark sound and focused, engaging musicality. She won 1st prize in the George Enescu International Competition in September 2024 and was a prize winner at the 2019 Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow and the 2018 Long-Thibaud Crespin competition in Paris, as well as First Prize winner of the Princess Astrid, Jascha Heifetz, and Irvin Klein competitions.

Mayumi has performed with many orchestras worldwide including the Mariinsky, Belgian National Symphony, Prague Radio Symphony, Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, Finnish Radio Symphony, NHK, Yomiuri, Tokyo Metropolitan and Sapporo Symphony Orchestras, amongst others. She has collaborated with conductors to include Charles Dutoit, Marc Piollet, Sylvain Cambreling, Yoel Levi, Nodoka Okinawa and Kazuihro Koizumi. Mayumi is a keen chamber musician working throughout Europe and Japan with friends and colleagues to include Giuseppe Guarerra, Ben Goldscheider, You Kosuge and the Lazarus String Quartet.

She is currently an ambassador for El Sistema Japan's new "Ribbon" project, bringing instruments and music education to children in the foster care system. Since October 2023 she is also a professor at the Hochschule für Künste in Bremen.

Her debut CD "Recital" with pianist Giuseppe Guarrera was released in Japan in February 2023 to wide critical acclaim, and in 2024 she received the "Fresh Artist" award from Nippon Steel.

Mayumi's musical education has been shaped by Kolja Blacher, Yoshiko Nakura, Masao Kawasaki, and Robert Lipsett.

She currently performs on the "Wilhelmj" Antonio Stradivarius violin from 1725, on generous loan from the Nippon Music Foundation.