Shin-ichi Fukuda
started playing the classical guitar at the age of eleven under Tatsuya Saitoh (1942–2006). In 1977 he moved to Paris and continued his music training at the Ecole Normale de la Musique, under Alberto Ponce, continuing his studies at the Accademia Chigiana in Siena with a scholarship, under Oscar Ghiglia during 1980–1984. After his diplomas in Paris and Siena, Fukuda was awarded many important competition prizes, including first prize in the 23rd Paris International Guitar Competition, organised by Radio France. Since then, for more than thirty years, he has pursued a brilliant concert carrier as a leading guitarist, performing solo recitals, concertos with orchestra, and chamber music in major cities around the world. Fukuda is also a highly gifted and enthusiastic teacher and has trained many pupils who have gone on to gain the highest honours; these include the young Japanese guitarists, Kaori Muraji, Daisuke Suzuki and Yasuji Ohagi, among others. He is a guest professor at Shanghai Conservatory (China), Osaka College of Music and Hiroshimaʼs Elisabeth University of Music and the Showa Music University. The distinguished Cuban composer Leo Brouwer dedicated to him his Concerto de Requiem – In memoriam Takemitsu II for guitar and orchestra. Fukuda was awarded the Japanese government 2011 Art Encouragement Music Prize and has more than eighty recordings to his credit.

Shigenori Kudo
is widely regarded as one of the world’s finest flautists. Born in Sapporo, Japan, Mr Kudo studied at Toho Gakuen School of Music before completing his musical education at the Conservatoire National de Paris with Jean-Pierre Rampal.

Laureate of several international competitions, notably first prize-winner in the 2nd Paris International Flute Competition in 1978 and the Jean-Pierre Rampal International Competition in 1980, Shigenori Kudo’s career takes him all over Europe, North and South America, Africa and Asia.

As well as giving many recitals, he is invited by conductors such as Seiji Ozawa, Krzystof Penderecki, Ferdinand Leitner, Leonard Slatkin, Horst Stein and Jean-François Paillard to perform with orchestras including the NHK Symphony, Saito-Kinen, Bavarian Radio Symphony, Johannesburg National Symphony, English Chamber Orchestra, Wiener Kammerorchester, Ensemble Intercontemporain, the Franz Liszt Chamber Orchestra, the Paillard Chamber Orchestra, the French national orchestras of Montpellier, Lille, Toulouse and all the major Japanese orchestras.

Mr Kudo is a regular visitor to many international festivals where his chamber music partners include Jessye Norman, Claude Bolling, the Trio Pasquier, the Zurich Trio, Marielle Nordmann, and the Vienna String Quartet.

He has made over 50 recordings, the most recent of which are the Mozart Flute Concerto K. 313 with Seiji Ozawa, a version of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons for flute with Jean-François Paillard and the Sinfonia Concertante by Mozart for flute, oboe, fagot and horn with Radek Baborak, Dag Jensen, Fumiaki Miyamoto also under Seiji Ozawa.

Shigenori Kudo currently resides in France and teaches at l´Ecole Normale de Musique de Paris.