Arcan Isenkul

Biography:

Arcan Isenkul was born in 2005 in Ankara. He started his music education in Bilkent University Music Preparatory Primary School’s viola department in 2014 with a scholarship, in Ece Akyol’s class. In 2023, he graduated successfully from Bilkent University Music Preparatory High School with a full scholarship in Cavid Cafer’s class.
He received several prizes in national and international soloist and chamber music competitions; as the “29th Young Musician International Competition ‘Città di Barletta’ (Barletta, first prize) and the 9th International Young Musicians Music Competition (Verona, first prize).

In 2017, 2018 and 2019, he won the Luzerne Music Center exams in the USA with a full scholarship and participated in the summer camp and studied viola with Laura Manko. During this time, he took orchestra and chamber music lessons and took part in concerts organized within the scope of the festival. In 2018, he won the first prize in the Concerto Competition held within the scope of the same festival, and was entitled to give a concert as a soloist accompanied by an orchestra. He gave concerts as a soloist with the Ankara Youth Symphony Orchestra in January 2019 and the Bilkent Youth Symphony Orchestra in April 2019 playing Andante and Hungarian Rondo by C.M. von Weber. In 2023 he performed with the Bilkent Symphony Orchestra playing Sinfonie Concertante by W.A. Mozart.

Isenkul, who started his composition studies with Can Bilir, participated in MATA Jr., which was held online in New York in August 2021. He was chosen as one of the six composers to take part in the festival. He was asked to write a new piece and his piece “Heves” was performed by Bergamot Quartet in Brooklyn/NY.

He took part in the Concertgebouworkest Young 2022 project and gave concerts in Het Concertgebouw and Elbphilharmonie with the soloist Isabelle Faust and the conductor Gustavo Gimeno. He won the auditions of the “Bilkent Music Days” in 2022-23 and gave chamber music concerts under the name of “Young Masters” as Capacità Quintet and Resonance Quintet. In 2023 he took part in the Verbier Festival Junior Orchestra and gave concerts with the soloist Nicola Benedetti and the conductor James Gaffigan as part of the festival. He also participated in the concerts of the Bilkent Youth Symphony Orchestra, Ankara Youth Symphony Orchestra, Turkish Youth Philharmonic Orchestra and Bilkent Symphony Orchestra.

He is currently studying his bachelor degree with Prof. Tabea