IBLA Foundation Winner

Young Pianist Mertol Demirelli

Turkey

Mertol Demirelli, pianist

IBLA Grand Prize Young Winner Mertol Demirelli was born in 1996 in Ankara. He began his music studies when he was four years old, private piano lessons followed when he was five. Displaying noticeable talent at the special admittance examinations, Mertol was accepted to the Bilkent University, Faculty of Music and Performing Arts, Music Preparatory Primary School with full scholarship. He studied piano with Associate Professor Ms. Oya Ünler for four years and with Professor Mr. Ersin Onay for a year. Mertol also continued his high school education and followed a special program for talented children at this school by taking courses on Music Theory, Ear Training, with Dr. Orhun Orhon, Composition with Dr.Turgut Pöğün, Dr. Orhun Orhon and Dr. Onur Türkmen and Violin with Eda Özer. He was accepted to the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel(Belgium) in Octocer 2010 with full scholarship. Since then, he is studying piano under the direction of Abdel Rahman El Bacha.

At the age of seven in 2003, he won the IBLA Grand PrizeItaly. The price included organization of concerts worldwide. In January 2004, Mertol gave concerts at Newcastle (England) in February 2004, at New York including Carnegie Hall and Arkansas-Little Rock (USA).

Since 2003, he gave concerts at various universities including, Anadolu, Bilkent, Boğaziçi, Hacettepe, Istanbul, Izzet Baysal and Yıldız. Demirelli performed at the Akbank Piano Days, The Mersin International Music Festival, Antalya International Piano Festival as well as special concerts at Turkish National Grand Assembly, Turkish Pediatric Foundation and Vehbi Koç Foundation. He also performed with The Spivakov Genious Children from Russia at Boğaziçi University in 2007.

He attended Gulsin Onay, Muhittin Demiriz, Idil Biret, Edna Golandsky and Dmitri Bashkirov’ s master-classes. He also performed with Fazil Say at his Ayvalık and Antalya International Piano Festival concerts. He performed W.A. Mozart’s Concerto for Piano No.11 when he was eight. At nine, the Piano Concerto No.12, at eleven, the Piano Concerto No.23. When he was ten in 2007, at the opening of 35th International Istanbul Music Festival, he played the J.S. Bach Concerto for Two Pianos, in C minor with world famous pianist İdil Biret at Hagia Eirene Museum.

In 2004, he played at the special vocations which Prof. Dr. İhsan Doğramaci gave to President of Azerbaijan; Ilham Aliyev, in 2005 the IMF Vice President; Ann Krueger and in 2007 President of Israel; Shimon Peres. In 2005 with the invitation of The Turkish Foreign Ministry he gave concerts in Jordan, in 2008 Lithuania and Switzerland in Geneva at Palais des Nations of UN. He played at the Spivakov Music Festival at Moskow in 2008 and at the Summer of Culture Festival at Bratislava in 2009.

Mertol Demirelli has given concerts with orchestras including the Bilkent Symphony Orchestra, Antalya, Bursa, Çukurova, İstanbul State Symphony Orchestras, The Borusan İstanbul Philharmonic and the Eskişehir Municipality, Doğuş Children’ s, Kaunas Symphony Orchestras and Presidential Symphony Orchestra. The conductors he collaborated with are Burak Tüzün, Ender Sakpınar, Gürer Aykal, Işın Metin, İbrahim Yazıcı, Kevin Griffiths, Modestas Pitrenas, Oğuzhan Kavruk and Rengim Gökmen.

Demirelli performed at the Antalya International Piano Festival, he played Mozart Concerto For Two Pianos with Hüseyin Sermet at Istanbul and Beethoven Triple Concerto at Munich in November 2008.

He will be giving Belgium premiere of Mozart’ s Violin and Piano Concerto, KV Anh. 56 (315f) in March 2011 at Brussels.