Dai Miyata, cello

In 2009, Dai Miyata won the Grand Prix in the 9th Rostropovich Cello Competition, becoming the first Japanese competitor to win the grand prize in the world's most prestigious competition. He won first prize in all of the contests in which he has participated. His splendid performances have attracted a lot of attention of composers and co-performers, gaining high praise from the world-class conductor Seiji Ozawa. He has performed internationally as one of the leading cellists from Japan.

Miyata graduated from the Conservatoire de Musique de Genève in Switzerland in 2009, and the Kronberg Academy in Germany in June 2013. He has studied cello with Sumiko Kurata and Frans Helmerson, and chamber music with the Tokyo Quartet, Sadao Harada, Koichiro Harada, Tomoko Kato, Nobuko Imai, Richard Young, and Gabor Takács-Nagy. Miyata has been actively performing as a concerto soloist with various major orchestras around the world, including the Orchestre de Paris, The State Academic Symphony Orchestra of Russia, the Sinfonietta Frankfurt, the Deutsche Radio Philharmonie Saarbrücken Kaiserslautern, the Slovak Philharmonic, the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Hungarian Radio Symphony Orchestra (Budapest Symphony Orchestra), the Vietnam National Symphony Orchestra, as well as major orchestra in Japan. He has also been working with world-famous conductors including Seiji Ozawa, Eliahu Inbal, Leoš Svárovský, Christoph Poppen, Dan Ettinger, Valery Polyansky, and Vassily Sinaisky, and has been co-performing with prominent musicians including Lynn Harrell, Gidon Kremer, Yuri Bashmet, Maxim Vengerov, and Augustin Dumay.
Miyata has also appeared in some documentary works including "Dialogue between Cellist Dai Miyata (25 years old) and Seiji Ozawa via Music" (nominated for the Prize of the Art Festival of the Agency for Cultural Affairs, Government of Japan), "The Youth in a Quartet", "NHK World - Rising Artist Dai", as well as the TV shows including "Classical Music Club", "La La La Classic", "Untitled Concert", "Hodo Station", "Nikkei Special Reserved Seat: Kanjuro Kiritake - Profound World of Bunraku", and "Tetsuko's Room". He also caused a great sensation by filling over 2000 seats at the major concert halls including the Suntory Hall and the MUZA Kawasaki Symphony Hall, which was unusual for a cellist.
He has received various other prestigious awards and prizes, including the 6th Hideo Saito Memorial Foundation Award, the 20th Idemitsu Music Prize (2010), the 13th Hotel Okura Music Award (2012), and the 74th Music Competition of Japan (2005). He is the recipient of scholarships from both the 35th Ezoe Scholarship Foundation and the Rohm Music Foundation. Recently, he has been actively involved with the development of young musicians by serving as a judge in the international competitions and as an instructor at the Rohm Music Seminar in 2019.

Miyata plays the 1698 Stradivarius cello known as “The Cholmondeley” lent by the Ueno Fine Chemicals Industry, Ltd.

Official Web Site

Yasuji Ohagi, guitar

After graduating from high school, Yasuji moved to Paris to study music at Ecole Normale de Musique de Paris and Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris. In 1998, he received the 2nd prize and the Special Jury Award (the Leo Brouwer Award) at the Havana International Guitar Competition. After that, he went to Siena, Italy, to study further at the Accademia Musicale Chigiana there for four years, having Oscar Ghiglia as his mentor, and received the highest honors for the four consecutive times.

Yasuji’s concert debut was at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. in 2003, which was broadcasted live worldwide via internet. In 2005, he was invited to “Cubadisco 2005,” the international music market in Cuba, as the first Japanese classical guitarist. He even was invited to join the Cuban National Symphony (conducted by Zenaida Romeu) to play “Concierto de Aranjuez,” which turned out to be a huge success. In 2006, Yasuji was invited to “International Guitar Festival Compensar” in Bogota, Columbia, where his solo performance was enthusiastically praised. His career was further expanded in the following year, 2007, to have solo concerts in Korea, and also in Taiwan in 2008.

In 2010, he was invited to play at the commemorative concert celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Orchesta Symphonica Nacional de Cuba, and played Piazolla’s “the Double Concerto for a Guitar and a Bandneon” with them, which was highly acclaimed. In the same year, he went on the road covering five cities in Canada organized by the Japan Foundation with the trio of his guitar, flute and violin. Also in 2010, he was invited to a guitar festival in Shanghai. His international fame has broadened further as he was again invited to Taiwan again where he played Rodrigo’s “Concierto Andaluz” and Brouwer’s “Gismontiana,” which were both very highly acclaimed.

Yasuji had his first CD released from Victor Entertainment in 2000. Ever since, he has had 12 CDs and 2 DVDs come out so far. His musical quest isn’t limited only in the field of classic, but covers various kinds of music expanding from Renaissance to contemporary, from solo to chamber music and concerto. His versatility has been well-proven by his collaborations with Jazz guitar players including Kazumi Watanabe and Yosuke Onuma, and with the Tokyo City Ballet. His activities beyond genres have been widely introduced by media including TV, radio and magazines.

His guitar mentors include Arberto Ponce, Shin-ichi Fukuda, Eduardo Fernandez, William Kanengiser, Olivier chassain, Carel Harms, Yoshihisa Nakano and Hiroshi Hagiwara. He studied solfeggio under the guidance of Junnosuke Yamada. He also studied baroque guitar, Lute and Theorbe under Eric Bellocq and chamber music under Laszlo Hadady. He recieved the 6th Hotel Okura Award, and the 18th Idemitsu Music Award. He is originally from Miyazaki Prefecture, Japan.

Official Web Site