Nadir Vassena

Nadir Vassena
© Carolina Piasecki

Nadir Vassena

Member of the jury 2020-2021

Nadir Vassena was born in Lugano, Switzerland. He studied composition in Milan under Bruno Zanolini and in Freiburg im Breisgau under Johannes Schöllhorn. In 1993 he attended the composition courses of Brian Ferneyhough in Royaumont. He has received many awards, including: Westdeutscher Rundfunk (West German Radio) in 1992, the Music Institute of the Academy of Arts in Berlin in 1994 (1st prize), and the International Mozart Competition in Salzburg 1997 and was also awarded the Christoph Delz Foundation Prize 1999. Nadir Vassena was a scholar of the Schloss Solitude academy in Stuttgart in 2000-2001, a member of the Swiss Institute in Rome 2002-2003 and received a composition scholarship of the Landis & Gyr Foundation. Together with Mats Scheidegger, Nadir Vassena directed the Tage für Neue Musik Zurich 2004-2012. He lectures composition and analysis at the Conservatorio della Svizzera italiana (music academy). He was nominated for the 2015 Swiss Grand Award for Music.