top of page

Paul Taub Young Artist Competition

12th Annual Paul Taub Young Artist Competition 
Sunday, April 14, 2024

1st Place $1000 | 2nd Place $300 | 3rd Place $200 
Applications for the Young Artist Competition are now closed. Click here to learn about rules, repertoire, and more.
Congratulations, 2024 Winners!
1st Place - Yechan Min

Yechan Min was born in Seoul, Republic of Korea. He spent his childhood having a lot of opportunity to listen to music and played the flute in his school and youth orchestra.

​

After holding a high school degree in his country, he wanted to study the flute with a better education and in a broader place where there are more opportunities. At the age of seventeen, therefore, he started to study with “American Treasure” Ms. Paula Robison who insisted that he moved to Boston, Massachusetts at the New England Conservatory of Music. Not only it began his parts of years of the United States but also it gave huge changes in both his playing and personality.

​

He has received New England Conservatory’s Donna Heiken Presidential Flute Scholarship for his Master of Music degree since Fall 2023.

yechan_min.jpg
2nd Place - Kyungmin Eom
Kyungmin-Eom.jpg

Kyungmin “Gammi” Eom, a South Korean musician praised as a “unique flutist” with “colorful tones” (Busan Ilbo, 2014), is known for her bold and fearless performances. She holds a Masters of Music degree from The Juilliard School and will begin post-graduate studies in Orchestra Performance at The Manhattan School of Music under the tutelage of Robert Langevin in 2024.

 

Gammi has garnered numerous awards, most recently the grand prize winner of the Charleston International European Music Competition and the New York Laureate International Music Competition in 2022. Additionally, in 2019, she achieved 1st place in the In-je University Music Competition, and in 2014, she was awarded 2nd prize in the Music Association of Korea competition.

 

From 2015 to 2017, Gammi served as Principal Flute for the Busan Youth Philharmonic Orchestra. Since then, she has performed as a soloist with various orchestras, including the Busan National Philharmonic Orchestra, Manhattan School of Music Symphony Orchestra, Juilliard Orchestra, Changwon Philharmonic Orchestra, In-je University Orchestra, Charmwood Wind Ensemble, and Viento Flute Ensemble.

Gammi has also performed in the Orford Music Festival, Singapore Flute Festival, Gonjiam Flute Festival, and will attend the 2024 Aspen Music Festival and School. Additionally, she has had masterclasses with renowned flutists such as Andras Adorjan, Sharon Bezaly, Catherine Cantin, Michael Cox, Mathieu Dufour, Sooyun Kim, Michael M Kofler, Barthold Kuijken, Yerin Lee, Lorna McGhee, Sukyung Park, Loic Schneider, Irina Stachinskaya, Paolo Taballione, Jean-Michel Tanguy, and Carol Wincenc.

​

Outside of music, Gammi enjoys trying new restaurants and spending time with her cats.

3rd Place - Isaiah Obey

Born in Southern California, flutist Isaiah Obey grew up in Minnesota, Texas, and Washington state. He is currently pursuing his Master of Music degree from Lynn University with Jeffrey Khaner of the Philadelphia Orchestra. He received his bachelor’s degree in Flute Performance at Eastman School of Music as a student of Bonita Boyd and Anne Harrow.

​

Isaiah is the first prize winner of the Texas Flute Society’s Donna Marie Haire Young Artist Competition and the Rochester Flute Association’s Emerging Artist Competition. He was also a member of the 2015 National Youth Orchestra of the United States of America and has also been a member of the Seattle Youth Symphony Orchestra. His teachers also include Pam Adams of the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra and Zart Dombourian-Eby of the Seattle Symphony. Isaiah is a substitute musician with the Sarasota Orchestra and New World Symphony.

Isaiah Obey.JPG
2024 Adjudicators

Marianne Gedigian is currently Professor of Flute at Rice University's Shepherd School of Music. Previously, she was holder of the Butler Professorship in Music and a member of the Academy of Distinguished Teachers at The University of Texas at Austin.

 

Ms. Gedigian was a regular performer with the Boston Symphony Orchestra for over a decade, including many seasons as Acting Principal Flute under Seiji Ozawa. As Principal Flute with the Boston Pops Esplanade Orchestra and Acting Principal Flute with the Boston Pops, she has been heard on dozens of recordings and Evening at Pops television broadcasts as well as the nationally broadcast Fourth of July specials on public television. She has also been heard on several John Williams' movie scores, including Saving Private Ryan and Schindler's List. In the 2000 - 2001 season, Ms. Gedigian was invited by Mariss Jansons to perform as Acting Principal Flute with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra.

​

Her solo performances have taken her around the world, including recitals in Japan, Australia, England, and Armenia, and she has appeared as concerto soloist numerous times with the Boston Pops Orchestra and with the Armenian Philharmonic performing her own transcription of the Khachaturian Violin Concerto. She was featured with Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull fame in a performance at the Berklee College of Music in Boston. Ms. Gedigian has been a headliner soloist and teacher at numerous National Flute Association conventions across the country, and is a frequent recitalist and teacher across the globe.

Ms. Gedigian was first prizewinner in the National Flute Association's Young Artist Competition, and the James Pappoutsakis Memorial Flute Competition. She is a founding member of Boston-based chamber music ensemble Walden Chamber Players and was formerly a member of the Dorian Wind Quintet, one of chamber music's preeminent and longest continuously-active ensembles. Ms. Gedigian's solo recordings include Voice of the Flute and Revolution, both with pianist Rick Rowley, and she is featured on a recording of flute, strings, and piano with the Walden Chamber Players titled Finding a Voice: The Evolution of the American Sound. She is the featured soloist on the Naxos Grammy-nominated CD, Shadow of Sirius.

Ms. Gedigian has served on the faculties of Boston University's College of Fine Arts, The Boston Conservatory, the Round Top International Institute, and the Tanglewood Music Center and the Brevard Music Center. Her teachers include Leone Buyse, Doriot Anthony Dwyer, Clement Barone, and Donna Olkowski. Ms. Gedigian is a William S. Haynes Artist and performs on a handmade custom-crafted Haynes gold flute.

​

~ ~ ~

​

Judy Washburn Kriewall has recently retired from the Seattle Symphony Orchestra, where she was a member of the flute section from 1979-2021.  During those years, she also played with the Seattle Opera and the Pacific Northwest Ballet, as well as in chamber concerts and as a soloist with the Symphony.  Mrs. Kriewall earned her Bachelor of Music (1978) and Master of Music (1979) at Northwestern University, studying flute performance with Walfrid Kujala.  She also had the opportunity as a member of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago to receive coaching with Donald Peck.

​

~ ~ ~

​

Dr. Sandra Saathoff is a freelance flutist, clinician, and principal flute of the Seattle Philharmonic. She helped launch a nonprofit organization, Silver Flight Ensembles and Foundation, dedicated to helping student flutists, and currently conducts the Bellevue Youth Symphony Orchestra’s flute ensemble. A published author and music arranger, Dr. Saathoff has also performed and taught throughout the United States and Europe. Sandra has served as Assistant Program Chair, Secretary, Convention Manager, and on the Long-Range Strategic Planning Committee for the National Flute Association; as well as President, Vice President, Hospitality Chair, and Newsletter Editor for the Seattle Flute Society. 

​

She enjoys teaching flutists of all ages and has served as adjunct flute faculty at Cornish College of the Arts and Seattle Pacific University; taught elementary and middle-school band and orchestra, and coached at the Midsummer Musical Retreat for adult musicians. She enjoys planning large scale flute events and masterclasses, such as the Northwest Flute and Piccolo Forum. 

​

Her teachers include Zart Dombourian-Eby, Rae Terpenning; Kim Pineda and Janet See (Baroque flute); and Leo Mac Namara and Conal O’Grada (Irish flute). She recently completed her doctoral studies in flute performance at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln with Dr. John Bailey. 

​

~ ~ ~

Past Winners

2023

1st Place: Jarrett May

2nd Place: Julia Pyke

3rd Place: Jeong Won Choe

​

2022

1st Place: William Yeh

2nd Place: Daniel Fletcher

3rd Place: You Yang

​

2021

1st Place: Susan Kang

2nd Place: Yidi Song

3rd Place: Allison DeFrancesco

​

2020

1st Place: Yi Xiang

2nd Place: Jungah Yoon

3rd Place: Joyce Lee

 

​

 

2019

1st Place: Won Lee

2nd Place: Charles Gibb

3rd Place: Ann Green

​

2018

1st Place: Min Ha Kim

2nd Place: Ryan Foley

3rd Place: Douglas DeVries

 

2017

1st Place: Cassie Lear
2nd Place: Vivian Lee

3rd Place: Joyce Lee

​

2016

1st Place: Jeiran Hasan

2nd Place: Evan Pengra Sult

3rd Place: Benton Gordon

​

2015

1st Place: Colleen McElroy

2nd Place: Raoul Cho

​

​

2014

1st Place: Yerim Choi
2nd Place: Min Hee Kim

3rd Place: Joshua Romatowksi

​

2013

1st Place: Julian Rose

2nd Place: Jodie Rottle

3rd Place: Cassie Lear

​

bottom of page