The International Classical Music organized their annual Award Ceremony and Gala this at the Tonhalle Düsseldorf. It was a magnificent event, with a sold-out concert with Düsseldorfer Symphoniker and numerous artists. 20.000 people followed the livestream on Deutsche Welle.

The Award Ceremony was hosted by ICMA President Remy Franck and Secretary General Nicola Cattò. In his introduction, Remy Franck emphasized that in a music industry that is becoming more and more difficult for its actors, « the ICMA stand as a bright light house to show the world what are not only good, but outstanding recordings, in complete independence from the music industry. » Franck said: « This is all the more important as we know how much the musicians have to invest for having their albums produced. And we know how badly the industry and the musicians are treated by the retailers, and I especially speak of the Internet platforms. Industry managers heavily complain that as small companies they have no power at all, and get no good conditions with the various platforms. »

In the afternoon ceremony honoring the winners ICMA organized a musical prelude with two young artists from the 2025 awards panel, Turkish pianist Can Cakmur and Can Sarac who played an Allegretto by Franz Schubert.

The program for this Gala concert featured winners of this year’s award panel with an attractive musical program,

Winners of two Special Awards, Düsseldorfer Symphoniker and Adam Fischer, began with Wolfgang A. Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro overture.

Can Cakmur, winner in the Solo Instrument category, played an inventive Rondo from Ludwig van Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 3, while Special Achievement Winner Oliver Triendl performed the first movement of Antal Dorati’s seldom played Piano Concerto, conducted by Vitali Alekseenok.

The Danel Quartet, winner in the Chamber Music category, intensively played the 1st movement of Dmitri Shostakovich’s String Quartet No. 2.

Then it was the turn of Lifetime Achievement winner Gidon Kremer to move the audience with Ukrainian Valentyn Silvestrov’s Serenade and Viktor Kosenko’s Dreams (arranged by Andrei Pushkarev) in a captivating musical and political message.

David Popper’s Hungarian Rhapsody was beautifully played by Ettore Pagano, this year’s ICMA Classeek Award.

Baritone Jérôme Boutillier, representing Bru Zane, winner in the Premiere Recordings Category, sang Je m’efforce en vain de te plaire, from Le Tribut de Zamora by Charles Gounod.

The first part closed splendidly with Georg Friedrich Händel’s Royal Fireworks Music Overture conducted by Leonardo García-Alarcón.

The much applauded world premiere of Austrian composer’s Christoph Ehrenfellner brilliant new work Wiener Blut 200 took place right after the intermission and, conducted by Ehrenfellner himself.

Anna Gourari was the much-admired soloist in Paul Hindemith’s Sanguine from The four temperaments, while Young Artist of the Year Benjamin Kruithof played Piotr Tchaikovsky’s Pezzo capriccioso.

Then followed Gustav Mahler’s Revelge sung by Samuel Hasselhorn, and conducted by Lukasz Borowicz, both winners in the Vocal Music category.

Andreas Scholl, countertenor, Alessandro Tampieri, conductor, winners in Baroque Vocal performed excerpts from Antonio Vivaldi’s Stabat Mater.

Stanko Madić, violin, represented the Label of the Year, BR Klassik, with excerpts from Distant Light by Peteris Vasks.

The concert ended highly symbolically with the last movement of Piotr Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1, played by Discovery Award winner Can Saraç, who as a musician with a bright future symbolized ICMA’s path into the next years.