Composer Jin Eun-sook Awarded the 'Classical Nobel Prize' Ernst von Siemens Music Prize

First Asian Honoree
Receives 250,000 Euro Prize
Professor Jin Joong-kwon's Sister

Korean composer Jin Eun-sook has been honored as the first Asian to receive the Ernst von Siemens Music Prize, often called the "Nobel Prize of classical music."

The Ernst von Siemens Foundation and the Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts announced on the 25th that Jin Eun-sook was selected as the recipient of the Ernst von Siemens Music Prize. Jin Eun-sook will receive a prize of 250,000 euros (approximately 360 million KRW).

Jin Eun-sook, who graduated from Seoul National University's composition department, studied under the great composer Gy?rgy Ligeti at the Hamburg University of Music. She gained international fame in 2004 after winning the Graeme Meyer Award for her violin concerto. Since then, she has swept awards such as the Sibelius Music Prize (2017), the Marie Jos? Kravis Music Award (2018), the Bach Music Prize (2019), and the L?onie Sonning Music Prize (2021).

Composer Jin Eun-sook
[Photo provided by Tongyeong International Music Foundation, Photo by Priska Ketterer]

She has served as resident composer for the Berlin Deutsche Symphony Orchestra (2001), resident composer for the Tongyeong International Music Festival (2005), principal composer for the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra (2006), and artistic director of the Philharmonia Orchestra in the UK (2010). Since 2022, she has been the artistic director of the Tongyeong International Music Festival.

World-class orchestras such as the Berlin Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony, and Radio France Philharmonic, as well as contemporary music ensembles like Ensemble InterContemporain and Ensemble Modern, have commissioned and performed Jin Eun-sook’s works. At the end of last year, the Berlin Philharmonic released the "Berlin Phil Jin Eun-sook Edition," a box set of recordings of her orchestral and concerto works made over 17 years.

Jin Jung-kwon, a political commentator and former professor at Dongyang University, is her younger brother.

The Ernst von Siemens Music Prize is awarded by the Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts in the name of the Ernst von Siemens Foundation and is regarded as the most prestigious award in the classical music world. It is often compared to the Nobel Prize or the Fields Medal.

Each year, one individual is selected across the fields of classical music composition, conducting, instrumental performance, vocal performance, and musicology, with the criterion being their contribution to human culture.

Past recipients include composers Benjamin Britten, Olivier Messiaen; conductors Herbert von Karajan, Leonard Bernstein, Claudio Abbado, Daniel Barenboim; violinist Gidon Kremer; pianist Maurizio Pollini; and Alfred Brendel.