Guest soloists for the 2026 season
The finest classical music – selected artists for special concert moments
LIN TOKURA - Violin
Lin Tokura is a young violinist born in Tokyo and raised in Seattle. She began playing the violin at the age of three and made her orchestral debut at eleven after winning the Cascade Symphony Orchestra’s Rising Star Competition in Washington State. Since then, she has developed an international concert career, performing in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, the Czech Republic, Italy and Portugal.
As a soloist, Lin has performed with the Seattle Symphony, Olympia Symphony, Lancaster Symphony Orchestra, Philharmonia Northwest, Seattle Festival Orchestra and Bellevue Chamber Orchestra. Her international orchestral appearances include performances with the Vancouver Metropolitan Orchestra, Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra, London City Philharmonic, FVG Orchestra, Accademia d’Archi Arrigoni and the Bendada International Music Festival String Orchestra.
She currently studies at the Yehudi Menuhin School in the United Kingdom under the guidance of Dr Robin Wilson. In 2026, Lin became the youngest recipient to date of a scholarship from Japan’s prestigious Rohm Music Foundation.
Lin is a prizewinner at numerous international competitions. At the Eastbourne Symphony Orchestra Concerto Competition, she became the youngest finalist in the competition’s 37-year history at the age of thirteen. She received the Runner-up Prize, the St Cecilia Bequest Award and the Duke of Devonshire Award for the most promising musician under eighteen. At the Il Piccolo Violino Magico International Competition in Italy, she won Third Prize, the Audience Prize and the prize for the best performance of Perpetuum mobile.
At the International Beethoven Society’s Young Ludwig Music Competition in Berlin, Lin received both First Prize in her category and the overall Grand Prize for performers under eighteen. This distinction led to a performance opportunity with the Berlin Symphony Orchestra at the Karajan Hall. Her previous achievements also include First Prize at the Kocian International Violin Competition in the Czech Republic and the Grand Prize at the Vancouver International Music Competition, where, at the age of eleven, she won the overall string category in a division open to competitors up to the age of thirty-five. She has also received top prizes at the Arthur Grumiaux International Violin Competition, the Walgreens National Concerto Competition and the Seattle Young Artists Music Festival.
As a soloist and chamber musician, Lin has performed three times at Carnegie Hall. Further concert appearances have taken her to the Bösendorfer Hall at the Mozarthaus Vienna, the Amadeus International School and The Menuhin Hall. Her chamber music performances have also been broadcast by Seattle’s classical radio station KING FM 98.1, while her artistic development has been featured by The Strad and The Violin Channel.
Her festival appearances include Center Stage Strings at the University of Michigan, the Tonebase Violin Festival in Germany, the Valdres Summer Symphony in Norway, the Keshet Eilon International Summer Mastercourse in Spain and the Bendada International Music Festival in Portugal. She has received artistic guidance in masterclasses and lessons from distinguished musicians including James Ehnes, Timothy Chooi, Itzhak Rashkovsky, Noah Geller, Gérard Poulet, Koichiro Harada, Kyoko Takezawa, Michiko Kamiya, Tamaki Kawakubo and Mayuko Kamio.
Lin performs on a 1766 Nicolò Gagliano violin, generously on loan from the Beare’s International Violin Society. Alongside her musical activities, she has built an active social-media presence with a combined following of more than 70,000. She has also studied Japanese calligraphy since the age of five and was a national category winner in Japan in 2020, 2021 and 2023.
On 16 October 2026, Lin will make her debut as a guest soloist with the Dresdner Residenz Orchester in Nuremberg.
KESCHAV KRISHNAN - Piano
Keshav Krishnan, born in 2013, is a young classical pianist based in the Netherlands and Belgium. He began taking piano lessons at the age of seven. After studying with Denise Lutgens and Giuliano Adorno, he joined the Conservatorium Maastricht in 2023. He initially studied there with Alejandro Serena and Joop Celis and, since September 2025, has continued his training with Alejandro Serena and Ashley Wass.
Keshav is a prizewinner at numerous national and international piano competitions. Among his most recent distinctions are first prize at the Steinway International Piano Competition 2026, first prize and the audience prize at the Prinses Christina Concours, as well as first prize and the Carnegie Hall Prize at the César Franck International Piano Competition in Brussels. He has received further first prizes at competitions including the Silicon Valley Open Doors Piano Competition, the Danubia Talents International Piano Competitions, the Franz Liszt Center International Piano Competition and the Jurica Murai International Piano Competition in Croatia. He has also been recognised on several occasions for his musicality and his interpretations of works by Frédéric Chopin.
His concert activity has already taken him to distinguished venues and festivals across Europe. He has given recitals at the Salle Cortot in Paris, the Mozarteum in Salzburg, the Grachtenfestival in Amsterdam, in Mödling near Vienna, in Perugia and in Belgium. As a soloist, he has performed with ensembles including the Concertgebouw Chamber Orchestra, the Cyprus Symphony Orchestra, the Narva Symphony Orchestra, the César Franck Orchestra, the Artematica Orchestra Brescia and Ensemble Les Virtuoses in Paris.
His concerto repertoire includes Ludwig van Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 3, Frédéric Chopin’s Piano Concerto No. 2, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 12 and Johann Sebastian Bach’s Piano Concerto in F minor. His solo repertoire also includes works by Haydn, Schumann and Liszt.
Keshav has participated in numerous international academies and festivals, including the Mozarteum International Summer Academy in Salzburg, the Académie Internationale de Musique de Paris, Music Fest Perugia and the Grachtenfestival. He has also received artistic guidance in masterclasses with internationally active pianists and teachers including Pavel Nersessian, Ingmar Lazar, Leonel Morales, Philippe Raskin and Vincenzo Balzani.
He has been introduced to a wider audience through appearances on the Dutch television programme Podium Klassiek, as well as on NPO Radio Klassiek and AVROTROS. Beyond music, Keshav has a particular interest in quantum physics and neuroscience. In his free time, he enjoys reading non-fiction, playing chess and writing code in Python and Java.
Keshav will make his debut as a guest soloist with the Dresdner Residenz Orchester in Nuremberg on 16 October 2026. He will perform with the ensemble again on 2 January 2027 at the Herkulessaal of the Munich Residenz.
Elias David Moncado - Violin
The 25-year-old German-Spanish-Malaysian violinist, currently a scholarship holder of the Anne-Sophie Mutter and Gautier Capuçon Foundations, is regarded as “one of the greatest talents of his generation” (Anne-Sophie Mutter). As the youngest winner of the 1st Grand Prix and 10 special prizes at the 2019 Karol Lipinski International Competition in Poland, as well as winner of the 2021 Valsesia Musica International Competition and the Vladimir Spivakov International Competition, his playing is characterised by a “sound that electrifies and moves” (Badische Zeitung).
He has appeared as a guest at various festivals, including the Lucerne and Gstaad Festivals, the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival, the Kissinger Musiksommer, the Rheingau Music Festival and the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festival. Solo projects in his still-young career include concerts with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Württemberg Chamber Orchestra Heilbronn, the Baden-Baden Philharmonic, the Göttingen Symphony Orchestra, the Brandenburg Symphony Orchestra, the Freiburg Philharmonic Orchestra, the Sendai Philharmonic Orchestra in Japan, the Sofia Philharmonic, and the Budapest Symphony Orchestra, under conductors such as Sascha Goetzel, Vladimir Spivakov, Nayden Todorov, Ken Takaseki, Fabrice Bollon, Thomas Guggeis, Nicolás Pasquet, Heiko Mathias Förster and Ryusuke Numajiri. Together with Anne-Sophie Mutter and ‘Mutter’s Virtuosi’, he performs at international concert venues (the Musikverein in Vienna, the Berlin Philharmonie, the Alte Oper in Frankfurt, the Philharmonie Luxembourg and the Roy Thomson Hall in Toronto). Further highlights include his debut in 2026 with the Frankfurt Museum Orchestra at the Alte Oper, his debuts in 2025 at Carnegie Hall in New York, at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris with the Orchestre National d’Île-de-France, with the Korean Chamber Orchestra in Seoul, with the North Czech Philharmonic Orchestra at Smetana Hall in Prague, his debut at the Tonhalle Zurich in January 2024 with the Zurich Symphony Orchestra, his debut in 2023 at the Konzerthaus Vienna (recorded by Medici TV) as part of a tour of Germany, Austria and Bulgaria with Beethoven’s Violin Concerto and the Sofia Philharmonic Orchestra, his concerts as a debut artist at the Nikolaisaal in Potsdam from 2020 to 2022, and his Japanese debuts at the Hitachi Systems Hall in Sendai and the Meguro Persimmon Hall in Tokyo.
Elias David Moncado’s critically acclaimed debut CD was released in 2022 by Avi-Music, featuring works by Hindemith, Poulenc and Bartók. Even whilst studying under Latica Honda-Rosenberg, Zakhar Bron and Pierre Amoyal, and currently at the Kronberg Academy under Mihaela Martin, Elias David Moncado has been building an intensive concert career. His studies are made possible by the Benno and Ursula Stork-Wersborg Patronage.
He plays a collection of high-quality violins, including a Giovanni Battista Rogeri, Brescia (c. 1700), from the Deutsche Stiftung Musikleben Hamburg; a G.B. Guadagnini, Turin (c. 1771), on loan from a private collector; and the Stradivarius ‘Ludwig, Ex-Szigeti’ from 1724, made available to him by L-Bank Baden-Württemberg. He will be performing at the Konzerthaus Berlin on 27 May 2026.
Alexander Kortschmar - Violin
Alexander Kortschmar received his first violin lessons at the age of five from his mother, Tatiana Kortschmar, in St Petersburg.
He later studied with Lev Ivaschenko and subsequently took lessons from Stephan Picard, Liana Issakadze and Lydia Dubrovskaya in Berlin, Ingolstadt and Augsburg. He also attended several masterclasses with Zakhar Bron.
As an orchestral musician, he has held several positions as concertmaster and principal player, including in Frankfurt/Oder, Dresden and Stuttgart. In 2021, Alexander Kortschmar was a member of the Bayreuth Festival Orchestra. He has worked with renowned conductors such as Lorin Maazel, Herbert Blomstedt, Kent Nagano and Christian Thielemann. His long-standing collaboration with the conductor Teodor Currentzis has provided significant inspiration for his musical work.
As a soloist and chamber musician, he has given numerous concert performances in Germany, Russia and the USA.
Alexander Kortschmar is a prize-winner at several international competitions. His competition successes include, amongst others, 2nd prize at the International Competition in Kloster Schöntal, 2nd prize at the Medici International Music Competition and 1st prize at the Valencia Awards Online Music Competition. He will be performing with the DRESDNER RESIDENZ ORCHESTER on 29 May in Ulm and on 31 May in Karlsruhe.
Isabelle Serafin - Soprano
The young soprano Isabelle Serafin is one of the most highly acclaimed emerging artists of her generation, particularly in the Rossini repertoire. She captivates audiences with her stage presence, charm, warm lower register and brilliant high notes. In past and upcoming seasons, she has performed at venues including Halle Opera, Leipzig Opera, the Handel Festival in Halle, the Erzgebirgisches Theater, the Brandenburg Theatre, the Globe Theatre in Schwäbisch Hall, the Eisleben Theatre, the Ettlingen Castle Festival and several others.
In March 2026, she was awarded third prize at the London Classical Music Competition. As early as 2025, she received the sponsorship award from the ‘Verein Junge Stimmen Leipzig’. In September 2024, she once again won first prize at the International Talent Summer Competition in Italy. In June 2024, she was awarded the First Grand Prize and the maximum score of 100 out of 100 at the International Franco Margola Vocal Competition in Brescia (Italy). Isabelle Serafin is a Bayreuth Scholar (2019), a German Music Council Scholar (2022) and, since 2025, a scholar of Yehudi Menuhin Live Music Now Leipzig e. V.
On stage, she has already worked with renowned conductors such as Ivan Repušić, Andreas Wolf, Yura Yang, Bartholomew Berzonsky, Ulrich Maier, Jérémie Rhorer, Jonathan Santagada, Stefan Veselka, Leonardo Catalanotto, Stefan Birnhuber and Matthias Foremny.
In the summer of 2025, she will make her debut at the Händelfestspiele Halle in George Frideric Handel’s *Rinaldo*, singing the roles of Donna and the First Siren (musical director: Michael Hofstetter, director: Walter Sutcliffe). In the following season, she will appear at the Halle Opera as Contessa Ceprano and Paggio. She is currently appearing there as the goddess Minerva in Jacques Offenbach’s Orpheus in the Underworld. Last season, she also appeared in the children’s production Lullaby. Her repertoire includes roles such as Countess Ceprano (Rigoletto), Kate Pinkerton (Madama Butterfly), Adele and Ida (Die Fledermaus), Ljusja (Moscow, Cheryomushki), Clorinda (La Cenerentola), Musetta (La Bohème), Maria Bellacanta (Hexe Hillary geht in die Oper), Lauretta (Gianni Schicchi) and Yvette and Georgette (La Rondine).
During her bachelor’s degree, she was engaged for two consecutive years at the Mediterranean Opera Festival in Italy thanks to a scholarship, where she appeared in roles including Donna Elvira (Don Giovanni) and Gianetta and Adina in Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore. In Bremen, she appeared in several productions in collaboration with the Theater am Leibnizplatz, including as Pamina and the First Lady (The Magic Flute), Susanna (The Marriage of Figaro), Frasquita (Carmen) and in Joseph Haydn’s Il mondo della luna. Isabelle Serafin is currently studying for a Master’s degree in Opera at the Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy University of Music and Theatre in Leipzig in the class of Prof. Brigitte Wohlfarth. She began her artistic training at the University of the Arts Bremen under Prof. Krisztina Laki and Thomas Mohr. Even before commencing her studies, she was involved in projects in the field of contemporary music. In addition to opera, she devotes herself intensively to the repertoire of lieder and oratorios. Since 2015, concert performances have taken her to Germany, Austria, Hungary, Switzerland and Italy.
Her first concert with the DRESDNER RESIDENZ ORCHESTER will take place at the Konzerthaus Berlin on 2 May 2026.
Lisa Hubig - Violin
Lisa Leonore Hubig, born in Dresden in 2016, began taking violin lessons at the age of three. Her exceptional musical talent and great enthusiasm for the instrument became apparent at an early age. She has received intensive training since the age of seven, which has had a decisive influence on her work on tone colour, expressiveness and musical independence in particular.
An international award at the 2024 Andrea Postacchini Violin Competition in Italy – a scholarship in Category A – was followed by her solo debut with the DRESDNER RESIDENZ ORCHESTER at the 2025 Christmas Concert. Her own compositions for small ensembles complement her artistic training. She will be performing at the Konzerthaus Berlin on 2 May 2026.