SINGER SELECTION
Meet the singers selected for the 2024 World Youth Choir Session
The international jury meeting for session 2024 took place in Berlin, Germany between 12-15 of January. During these days the jury selected the best singers from over 160 candidates. After many hours of listening to the numerous recordings and evaluating the applicants, the international jury finally chose 93 singers from 45 countries to be part of the World Youth Choir 2024 session.
Selection criteria
The selection was made by an international jury composed by the artistic director of the 2024 session - Jörn Hinnerk Andresen - and a jury representative from each of the three World Youth Choir patron organisations: Victoria Liedbergius on behalf of the European Choral Association, Burak Onur Erdem on behalf of the International Federation for Choral Music and Sasho Tatarchevski on behalf of Jeunesses Musicales International.
The singers that were selected for the 2020 World Youth Choir session cancelled due to covid, and will still be under the age limit by the time of the session in 2024, were directly invited to join the session.
The process was conducted taking into account the artistic and musical quality of each candidate through all the audition files submitted: voice range, sight reading abilities, vocal technical skills, ability to prepare a piece and voice performance throughout. Furthermore, the jury also took into consideration the complementarity of the voices of the singers selected in order to create a cohesive group in each section and for the whole choir and, whenever possible, to amplify the diversity of countries represented in the World Youth Choir.
The choice was often hard for the jury and the singers selected have now a heavy responsibility being part of the 2024 session. Many others could be also part of the choir and not being selected does not diminish their skills. The jury members invite all of them to continue vocal training to improve their musical abilities and performance and, for those who have not reached the age limit, to audition again next year.
Acknowledgments
The World Youth Choir Foundation would like to acknowledge all our partners, recruiters, alumni and audition supervisors that helped audition over 200 singers for this year’s edition of the programme. The recruitment process could not have been carried out without their invaluable help and for this we would like to publicly thank them.
We also thank the World Youth Choir jury and conductor for carrying out the hard task of listening to all the audition files and performing a fair and balanced selection of talented singers which will integrate the choir this year.
SELECTED SINGERS
Soprano section
Adriana Nube, Peru
Aisulu Amangeldy, Kazakhstan
Chanya Maneewan, Thailand
Djurdjica Babic, Serbia
Dögg Magnúsdóttir, Iceland
Elena Hristova, Bulgaria
Emily Parker, Canada
Felicitas Grunden, Germany
Gloria Agwata, Kenya
Inés Regina Magaña Ruiz, Mexico
Josefina Legarra, Uruguay
Joyce Bastos, Brazil
Kara Ann McBain, USA
Karen Fernanda Tapia Robles, Mexico
Kata Csicsics, Hungary
Lin, Tzu-Hsin, Taiwan
Linnéa Sirborn, Sweden
María del Mar Pans Vayà, Spain
Maša Prah, Slovenia
Öykü Küçük, Türkye
Pui Ying (Tiffany) Lui, Hong Kong
Queena Chan, Hong Kong
Sofia Portela, Portugal
Userova Yulduz Urakbaevna, Uzbekistan
Viktória Széchy, Hungary
Yuka Tokuda, Japan
Section Leader:
Carly Wingfield, USA
Alto section
Aleksandra Galkina, Estonia
Ania Suri, Canada
Aoife O'Brien, Ireland
Brigitta Dyah Utami Immanuella, Indonesia
Charmaine Gan, Malaysia
Clarita Jimena Quispe Poma, Peru
Dariia Holiatina, Ukraine
Felicity Afia Awuah, Ghana
Ilaria De Bortoli, Italy
Joanna Śnieg, Poland
Lára Ruth Clausen, Iceland
Liu, Ying-Jie, Taiwan
Maria Teresa Casuso Guinart, Spain
Melvin Apiyo, Kenya
Merly Priscila Martínez Moreno, Venezuela
Olivia Catherine Kern, USA
Rabea Vockeroth, Germany
Rebecka Ryd, Sweden
Robysell González, Venezuela
Seiichi Kamimura, Japan
Sydelle Gonsalves, India
Tsui, Hei Lam, Hong Kong
Section Leader:
Pınar Çanakçi Çavdur, Türkye
Tenor section
Bass section
Aurélien Lefèvre, Belgium
Edvin Morell, Sweden
Emmanuel Annan Dadzie, Ghana
Ferenc Sipos, Hungary
Francisco Bourgeois, Venezuela
Gerardo Alberto Vásquez Ortega, Mexico
James McKeown Obeng-Gyasi, Ghana
José Miguel de Almeida, Portugal
Josep Arnau Barberà Foronda, Spain
Juan Pablo Suescún Villafañe, Colombia
Kai William Leung, Canada
Kobe Lefebvre, Belgium
Lanselle Xaris Lindo Nantes, Philippines
Luca Zink, Germany
Massinos Elias Graba, Switzerland
Pablo Morales, Spain
Ricardo Morales, Guatemala
Ryuichi Katagiri, Japan
Santiago Alberto Barrios Grau, Colombia
Seth Passah, Ghana
Tobias Matej Mistelbauer, Austria
Yi-Hsiu Chung, Tawain
Section Leader:
Nathan Tax, Netherlands
All the singers have been contacted and the selected singers will take part in the session pending submission of their signed confirmation of attendance. The short-listed reserve singers will be contacted in case any of the selected singers is unable to take part in the World Youth Choir 2024 programme or fails to confirm their attendance.