Competition jury 2024

At Vienna State Opera, Isokoski appeared in 16 roles in 20 years, including Pamina in Mozart’s The Magic Flute, Donna Elvira in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, and the Marschallin in Strauss’ Der Rosenkavalier. In recent years, Isokoski has focused on teaching. Isokoski joined the Mirjam Helin jury for the first time in 2009 and became jury chair in 2022. She has also been a jury member at the International Art Song Competition of the Hugo Wolf Academy, as well as at the BBC Cardiff Singer of the World. 

Isokoski’s discography includes operas, oratorios, and works by Nordic composers, as well as by Schubert, Schumann and Strauss. 

Read the interview of Soile Isokoski from 2022 on our website.

Photo: Milla von Konow

Recent engagements include the title role of Mozart’s Don Giovanni at Houston Grand Opera, Dr. Dulcamara in Donizetti’s Elisir d’Amore at Seattle Opera, the Four Villains in Offenbach’s Les Contes d’Hoffmann at Teatro Alla Scala, and Enrico VIII in Donizetti’s Anna Bolena at Zurich Opera House. In 2019, Pisaroni appeared at Turku Music Festival in Handel’s Agrippina with Il Pomo d’Oro orchestra, Franco Fagioli and Samantha Hankey. 

In concert, Pisaroni has performed Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 and Schönberg’s A Survivor from Warsaw; Rossini’s Petite Messe Solennelle; Verdi’s Messa da Requiem with the Collegium Vocale Gent and Philippe Herreweghe; and Haydn’s Die Jahreszeiten under the direction of Nikolaus Harnoncourt. 

Pisaroni’s discography includes Handel’s Rinaldo from the Glyndebourne Festival, Mozart’s Così fan tutte, Don Giovanni, and Le nozze di Figaro from the Salzburg Festival, and Beethoven’s Mass in C Major with Mariss Jansons. 

Read more about Luca Pisaroni on his website.

Photo: JiyangChen

Shah studied at the University of Cambridge and the Royal Academy of Music in London. He has taught at several prestigious music conservatories and led, among other things, a lied masterclass at Wigmore Hall with the Finnish soprano Karita Mattila. 

Shah regularly performs with various soloists on international concert stages. Together with baritone Theodore Platt, Shah won the International Art Song Competition of the Hugo Wolf Academy in 2022. 

Shah regularly hosts music programmes on BBC radio channels and has made a documentary about Kaija Saariaho. Shah is also part of the planning team for the Helsinki Seriös concert series. 

Read more about Keval Shah on his website.

Photo: Gerard Collett

His roles include King Lear in Reimann’s Lear, Lord of Faninal in Strauss’ Der Rosenkavalier, Ryuji in Henze’s Das Verratene Meer, Eisenstein in Strauss’ Die Fledermaus, Jaroslav Prus in Janáček’s The Makropulos Affair and the title role of Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin. 

Forthcoming performances include Strauss’ Capriccio, Schnittke’s Life with an Idiot, and the premiere of Chin’s Dark Side of the Moon at Staatsoper Hamburg under the baton of Kent Nagano.

Skovhus’ extensive concert repertoire includes Mahler, Nordic composers, and Martin’s Six Monologues from Everyman. Together with Soile Isokoski, Skovhus has recorded Wolf’s Italienisches Liederbuch. 

Read more about Bo Skovhus on the Balmer & Dixon Management website.

Roles from her career include Cherubino in Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro and Dorabella in Così fan tutte, the title role in Bizet’s Carmen, Dido in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, Fricka in Die Walküre and Das Rheingold, as well as several other roles in Wagner’s operas, and Amneris in Verdi’s Aida. In the spring of 2024, she appears as Madame de Croissy in Poulenc’s Dialogues des Carmélites at her native opera house. 

Stene has also had a significant career as a concert singer, including performances at Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Musikverein in Vienna, Carnegie Hall in New York, and the Salzburg Festival. 

Stene has recorded Sibelius’ songs, as well as his Kullervo under the baton of Paavo Järvi. In 2007, she received the Sibelius Prize, awarded annually by the Sibelius Society in Norway for outstanding efforts to promote contact between Finnish and Norwegian musical life. 

Read more about Randi Stene on the Norwegian National Opera & Ballet website.

Her voice has inspired many composers, and her collaboration with them has produced numerous new works composed for her. The late Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho dedicated her opera L’amour de loin and oratorio La Passion de Simone to Upshaw. In the 2025–26 season, Upshaw will be singing in Saariaho’s Innocence at the Metropolitan under the baton of Susanna Mälkki. 

Upshaw is the head of the Vocal Arts Program at the Tanglewood Music Center. She regularly teaches master classes and workshops with young singers at festivals, conservatories and colleges. 

Read more about Dawn Upshaw on the Colbert Artists Management website.

Photo: Brooke Irish