“No melody, tone or emotion was beyond her as she played impeccably, dazzling the audience with bowing pyrotechnics that left no one in doubt of her sumptuous skills.” Star Online, March 2008

Youngest ever winner of the International Tchaikovsky Competition, Akiko Suwanai has established a prolific and prestigious international career, performing regularly in concert and recital in the major cities of Europe, the Americas and Asia.

Current highlights in her diary include performances with Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, Philharmonia Orchestra, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, the Academy of St.Martin-in-the-Fields, NHK Symphony, Budapest Festival Orchestra, Orchestre National de Lyon, MDR Leipzig and Bilbao and Barcelona Symphonies.

In Japan she regularly tours with Orchestre de Paris and Eschenbach, with NDR Symphony Orchestra under Dohnаnyi, with Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie and Paavo Jаrvi and with the Philharmonia and Ashkenazy.

Akiko Suwanai recently gave the world premiere of Peter Eotvos's composition Seven, a work dedicated to the astronauts who died in the Columbia shuttle disaster in February 2003. The first performance was at the Lucerne Festival with the Lucerne Festival Academy Orchestra under the baton of Pierre Boulez. Additional performances with Peter Eotvos himself conducting, included Gothenburg, Budapest, Berlin, Tokyo and at the 2008 BBC Proms. Akiko Suwanai has an exclusive recording contract with Universal and her releases to date have garnered much critical acclaim. Her extensive discography includes among others releases with the Academy of St Martin-in-the-Fields under Neville Marriner, the Philharmonia and Dutoit, a Slavonic album with the Budapest Festival Orchestra under Ivаn Fischer and a CD of Bach Concertos with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe. Akiko’s next Universal release will be a CD of Beethoven Sonatas with Nicholas Angelich in 2009. She will also record Eotvos’s Seven for Budapest Music Center Records for release in 2010.

Akiko has collaborated with renowned conductors, including Pierre Boulez, Lorin Maazel, Zubin Mehta, Seiji Ozawa and Wolfgang Sawallisch. The recipient of numerous awards, Akiko has been a winner at the International Paganini Competition (Italy), the International Japan Competition and the Queen Elisabeth International Competition (Belgium). She studied at the Toho Gakuen School of Music with Toshiya Eto, at Columbia University and the Juilliard School of Music with Dorothy DeLay and Cho-Liang Lin, and also at the Hochschule der Kunste in Berlin with Uwe-Martin Haiberg.

Akiko performs on the Antonio Stradivarius 1714 violin ‘Dolphin’, one of the most famous violins known today and previously owned by the celebrated violinist Jascha Heifetz. The ‘Dolphin’ violin is on loan from the Nippon Music Foundation.