The Geneva International Music Competition (French: Concours international d'exécution musicale de Genève) is one of the world's leading international music competitions, founded in 1939. In 1957, it was one of the founding members of the World Federation of International Music Competition (WFIMC), whose headquarters are in Geneva.^[1]

Today, the Geneva Competition alternates between several main disciplines: piano, flute, oboe, clarinet, cello, viola, string quartet, voice and percussion. Every second year, it offers a Composition Prize. Upcoming competitions are cello & oboe (2021), piano & composition (2022), flute & string quartet (2023) and voice & composition (2024).^[2]

Its prizewinners include world-famous artists such as Martha Argerich, Arturo Benedetti-Michelangeli, Victoria de los Ángeles, Alan Gilbert, Nelson Goerner, Friedrich Gulda, Heinz Holliger, Nobuko Imai, Melos Quartet, Emmanuel Pahud, Maurizio Pollini, Georg Solti, José van Dam, Christian Zacharias and Tabea Zimmermann.^[3]

In addition to its official prizes, the Geneva International Music Competition offers a career development programme, which provides precious support and advice to help boost laureates' careers. This programme includes two years of concert management, as well as CD recordings, international tours, a festival and professional workshops.^[4]

1st prize winners

Search all prizewinners from 1939 Archived 19 December 2018 at the Wayback Machine

Previous Disciplines

1995 and before, the competition also included a prize for Bassoon. ^[7]