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BIOGRAPHY
The Slovak violinist Dalibor Karvay started playing the violin at the age of three under the guidance of his father. His grasp of the instrument led him to make several recordings for the Slovak Radio in Bratislava during his studies at the Primary Art School in Vrútky. After graduating from the Žilina Conservatory, where he studied under prof. Bohumil Urban, he embarked on a course of study at the Vienna Conservatory in the class of the renowned professor Boris Kuschnir.
Some of Dalibor Karvay’s biggest competition successes include winning the Young Musicians meeting in Córdoba in 1996, receiving the Eurovision Grand Prix - Young Musician of the Year in 2002, the first prize at the Tibor Varga competition in 2003, the “New Talent” award at the International Tribute of Young Interpreters in 2005, as well as his victory at the David Oistrakh competition in Moscow in 2008. His prestigious concert for Prince Charles of Wales at the Windsor Castle in 2003 together with Mstislav Rostropovich is testament to his outstanding early musical achievement. Karvay graciously accepted repeated invitations to the Seiji Ozawa International Academy in Switzerland and was granted the Young Creator Award in the music category by the Tatra Bank Foundation in Slovakia. In 2009, the Slovak Republic awarded Karvay the Prize of the Minister of Culture for his exceptional artistic performance and successful international representation of Slovak interpretive art.
As a soloist, Dalibor Karvay has worked with many renowned conductors including Leif Segerstam, Ion Marin, Hiroyuki Iwaki, Jaap van Zweden, Marek Janowski, Alexander Rahbari, Benjamin Wallfisch, Ondrej Lenárd, Oliver Dohnányi, etc. His cooperation with orchestras also makes for an impressive list: the Vienna Symphonic Orchestra, the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Vienna Chamber Orchestra, the Camerata Salzburg, the German Symphony Orchestra Berlin, the National Theatre Orchestra Mannheim, the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, the English Chamber Orchestra, the Orchestra Ensemble Kanazawa, the Het Gelders Orkest, the Solistes Européens Luxembourg, the Slovak Philharmonic Orchestra, the Symphonic Orchestra of the Slovak Radio, the State Chamber Orchestra of Žilina etc. As a chamber musician, Karvay has collaborated with excellent international musicians including Radek Baborák, Julian Rachlin, Wenzel Fuchs, Boris Kuschnir, Magda Amara, Stefan Stroissnig and Daniel Buranovsky among others.
Dalibor Karvay won his audition for the Vienna Symphony Orchestra in 2020 and was appointed first concert master. For the orchestra’s “living room concert” during the Covid-19 pandemic, Karvay also performed Camille Saint-Saëns’ Introduction et Rondo capriccioso as a soloist with his home orchestra, demonstrating both his skill as a concert master and his primary devotion to solo performance. Dalibor violin is Antonio Stradivari, Cremona 1694, „ex Benecke“, on loan from the Oesterreichischen Nationalbank.
Karvay’s long and devoted quest for his ideal violin was documented in the international film “Stradivari – Search for Perfection”, released in 2004.
Next to his active concert career, Karvay has been a violin professor at the Music and Arts University of the City of Vienna since 2014.
