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The winners of the 21st annual Blue Ash/Montgomery Young Artist Competition were announced at the Orchestra’s Holiday Concert in December.
Twenty-three talented young artists vied for prizes this year, playing instruments ranging from violin to tuba, marimba and harp. There were three categories with three divisions each:
3, woodwinds, brass, percussion, guitar and harp plus a category for musicians 13 and under, regardless of the instrument they play.
Violinist Kaori Matsui, 16, was the first-place winner in the strings category while 15-year-old cellist Coleman Itzkoff took second place. Matsui, concertmaster of the Starling Chamber Orchestra, began her study of the violin in Japan at the age of 5. On Jan. 26 she was a featured performer on the NPR show “From the Top.”
Itzkoff plays principal cello for both the Starling Chamber Orchestra and the Cincinnati Symphony Youth Orchestra, and was also a featured soloist for “From the Top” in June 2007.
In the keyboard category two 16-year-olds took top honors, with Lexington, Ky., native Connie Wu in first place and Mount Healthy resident Aaron Southworth in second. Wu, who was a second-place winner two years ago, won a gold medal in the Young Artist Division of the World Piano Competition in 2005, one of many awards she has garnered in the last few years. Southworth, who is home-schooled, has been studying piano, most recently with John Toedtman, for seven years.

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