The American Harp Foundation
Grandjany Memorial Competition
2024
The American Harp Foundation is pleased to announce the winners of the 2024 Marcel Grandjany Memorial Competition, which took place virtually in early April.
The 2024 Grandjany Memorial Competition winners are Hallie Bentschneider, student of Carol McClure at The Harp School, Inc. UK Conservatory Program and Can Yang Zi Quan (known as Sunshine), student of Kathleen Bride at the Eastman School of Music.
The Grandjany Memorial Competition winners receive an award of $3,500. This competition was established in 1979 and was funded by Bernard Grandjany in honor of his father Marcel Grandjany and was enhanced by bequests from Mary Wheeler and Hermine Herbring.
French-born American harpist and composer Marcel Grandjany (1891–1975) helped create the American Harp Society, which he organized with a Founding Committee that met for the first time in 1962 at his New York apartment. To this day the American Harp Society has had a profound influence on the shaping of young harpists and the promotion of the harp as a serious musical instrument. This visionary artist began his harp studies at age eight with Henriette Renié and at age eleven was admitted to the Conservatoire de Paris, where he studied with Alphonse Hasselmans and won the coveted Premier Prix at age thirteen. He appeared as soloist with major orchestras under the direction of Gabriel Pierné, Alfred Cortot, Walter Damrosch, Serge Koussevitzky, George Szell, Fritz Reiner and Vladimir Golschmann and a soloist with such luminaries as Maurice Ravel. Maestro Grandjany organized the harp department of the Conservatoire de musique et d’art dramatique à Montréal, and was head of the Harp Department at both the Juilliard School and the Manhattan School of Music. His students included premiere harpists Anne Adams, Nancy Allen, Kathleen Bride, Sarah Bullen, Catherine Gotthoffer, Ruth Inglefield, Karen Lindquist, Eileen Malone, Emily L. Oppenheimer, and Gretchen Van Hoesen.
2024 Repertoire Committee
Sarah Bullen — Principal Harp, Chicago Symphony Orchestra
Kathleen Bride — Professor of Harp, Eastman School of Music
Frances Duffy — Principal Harp, Hudson Valley Philharmonic, Wheeling Symphony and Allentown Symphony, New York City, and Broadway freelance harpist
Other Foundation Awards are described on the Scholarships page.
For those seeking to pay Competition Application Fees, please use this link:
2024 Required Repertoire
- Grandjany — Children at Play, Op. 16
- Bach/Grandjany – Etude No. 2, Fugue in D minor
from Bach/Grandjany — Etudes for Harp - Grandjany – Children’s Hour Suite, Op. 25
(entire)
Past winners of the Marcel Grandjany Memorial Competition are ineligible to compete
Requirements:
- Members of the American Harp Society
- The age limit is 35 as of the due date of the application, which is now available in the link on this webpage.
Applicants are asked to:
- Submit an application with resumé (full packet will be posted soon) and both video and audio recordings, along with a non-refundable application fee of $45 (via DONATE Button or by check/money order) by April 5, 2024. Letters of recommendation are not required (in an effort to reduce the burden on both teachers and students).
- Prescreen Instructions: Video recordings are to be sent via unlisted/private youtube, and audio recordings are to be extracted and sent electronically along with the full application packet. Recordings do not have to be completed in one session for Prescreen, though they must be recorded uninterrupted for Final Round. No editing in either Prescreen or Final Rounds is allowed.
For further information:
American Harp Foundation Awards
c/o Carrie Kourkoumelis
28 Cargill Street
Melrose, MA 02176