AYLA ŞAHIN VIOLIN
German-Turkish violinist Ayla Şahin was born in Brighton, United Kingdom, and began learning the violin and piano at the age of six. Performing regularly as a soloist and chamber musician, she has appeared at prestigious venues and festivals such as Wigmore Hall, Kings Place, Royal Albert Hall, KKL Luzern, Stadtcasino Basel, Swiss Chamber Music Festival, Festival Jong Talent Schiermonnikoog, Yellow Barn and IMS Prussia Cove. An outstanding chamber musician, she has collaborated with artists such as Sheku Kanneh-Mason, Bruno Delepelaire, Alena Baeva, Tom Poster, and Timothy Ridout, and is a member of Trio Archai, who recently won the 72nd Royal Overseas League Competition (2024) and were prize winners at the 2023 Orpheus Swiss Chamber Music Competition. Ayla recorded Bloch's Prelude for String Quartet (2019) and ‘Carnival of the Animals’ (2021) for Decca Classics, the latter being performed at the BBC Proms 2021 and broadcast on BBC 4 and BBC Radio 3. At the age of fourteen, Ayla won a full scholarship to study at the Junior Department of Royal Academy of Music in London and subsequently graduated with honors in 2021, studying with Jack Liebeck. In her final year, she won the concerto competition and performed Barber’s Violin Concerto under the baton of Gergely Madaras. She then spent a year at the Universität Mozarteum Salzburg and is currently pursuing her master's degree at the Musik Akademie Basel with Rainer Schmidt. She has received guidance from artists such as Leonidas Kavakos, Patricia Kopatchinskaja, Donald Weilerstein, Ilya Gringolts, Pavel Vernikov, Alexander Lonquich, Robert Levin, and András Keller. Ayla is grateful for the support of the Countess of Munster Trust, the Stiftung Lyra, Melinda Esterházy de Galantha Stiftung and the Musik Akademie Basel. She plays on a violin by Johannes Cuypers, on generous loaned from the Beare's International Violin Society.