Staff Accompanists for 2026

Sooyeon Baik

Sooyeon Baik 

Ilan Kurtser

Pianist Ilan Kurtser is a Britten-Pears Young Artist, Samling Artist and Leeds Lieder Young Artist. He won numerous prizes in competitions in the UK and abroad, including First Prize at the Copenhagen International Lied Duo Competition, Kathleen Ferrier Awards Accompanist Prize and Bampton Classical Opera Competition Accompanist Prize. Ilan was a finalist at the Wigmore Hall International Song Competition 2024 together with baritone Jonathan Eyers.

Ilan was a Bicentenary Scholar at the Royal Academy of Music, where he studied Piano Accompaniment with Michael Dussek, James Baillieu and Malcolm Martineau. As part of his Bicentenary Scholarship, he is recording his debut CD of the complete Goethe-Lieder by Hugo Wolf.

Concert highlights have included recitals with Gweneth Ann Rand and Stephen Whitford at the Aldeburgh Festival, recital violist Paul Silverthorne in London and Museo del Violino in Cremona, Italy, recital with mezzo-soprano Helen Charlston in Leeds Lieder Festival, recital with Elizabeth Watts in Jersey, and performances at Wigmore Hall, International Lied Festival Zeist, Sage Gateshead, Leeds Victoria Hall and Jerusalem Music Centre.

Ilan was a Fellow at the Royal Academy of Music where he curated over 20 concerts for the Academy Song Circle and Academy Voices concert series, teaching and coaching singers and pianists.  Ilan is currently a répétiteur for the Royal Academy Opera.