Saturday, March 22-
Don Bushell Concerto Competition

Rachel Wong is the First Place winner of the 2008 Don Bushell Concerto Competition, a prestigious event hosted each spring by the Seattle Philharmonic. Wong took top prize out of a field of talented contenders with her performance of excerpts from the Sibelius Violin Concerto.

The 2008 Bushell Competition was held this March 22 at McKay Chapel on the Lakeside Upper School campus in Seattle.

In addition to a performance development grant paid by the orchestra, Wong also wins a concert date to perform the entire Sibelius concerto next season with the SPO.

First Runner this year was Letitia Jap, violin, with the Violin Concerto #5 by Vieuxtemps, and Second Runner was Graham Logen with the Concerto for Bassoon & Strings by Gordon Jacob. Each of these musicians has the possibility of playing next season with the SPO in the event that the competition winner is unable to participate in the scheduled concert.

Honorable Mentions were also awarded to Michael Davis with the Concertino Pour Trompette by Jolivet, and to Torrey Kaminski with the Concerto in D Major for flute by Mozart.

The adjudicators for the 2008 Bushell event were Bruce Cronk, Andrew Krus and Rob Tucker.

SPO Music Director Adam Stern and the SPO Competition Committee would like to congratulate the entire field of contestants for the extraordinary musicianship that each of them demonstrated in this year's competition.