Sergej Tchirkov
accordion
Sergej Tchirkov was born in St.Petersburg in 1980 and studied the accordion at the Rimsky-Korsakov Special Secondary Music Lyceum. He graduated from the Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatory in 2003, class of Professor Alexander Dmitryev. In 2003-2005 he took a postgraduate course and qualified as an assistant teacher in accordion performance and chamber music.
Sergej has attended seminars and lectures on composition conducted by Sergej Slonimsky, Gerard McBurney, Terry Riley, Paul-Hainz Dittrich and Ernst-Helmuth Flammer. In 2004 he received a scholarship from the European Centre of Arts Hellerau (EzdK) where he also studied improvisation with Anton Lukaszeviece.
Sergej Tchirkov has been awarded prizes at the following international competitions:
2003 – Citta di Capistrello, Italy
2001 – Lasse Pihlajamaa competition for virtuoso accordionists, Finland
2001 – Coupe Mondiale, UK
1999 – Citta di Castelfidardo, Italy
1999 – Citta di Lanciano, Italy
1998 – Citta di Castelfidardo, Italy
1996 – Coupe Mondiale jr. Cat, Slovak republic
1996 – Andreev competition, Russia
Sergej has collaborated with composers such as Pierluigi Billone, Hanna Eimermacher, José María Sánchez Verdú, Ivan Fedele, Klaus Lang, John Palmer, Dieter Schnebel, Martin Schlumpf, Gérard Zinsstag, Boris Filanowski, Sergej Newski, Dmitri Kourliandski. and more, and premiered numerous works featuring the accordion. He has performed at various new music festivals including Sound Ways, Territoria, Dresden Days of Contemporary Music, Moscow Forum, MärzMusik, Klangspuren Schwaz. In 2002 he was guest performer at EXPO 2002 (Switzerland).
Sergej has played both as a soloist and a member of an orchestra, including with the Mariinsky Theatre Orchestra, the St.Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra, the Musica Aeterna ensemble, Neue Dresdner Kammermusik, KNM-Berlin, AJO ensemble Bodo and more,
He has been a member of following ensembles: Pro Arte Foundation eNsemble (St.Petersburg), Zero ensemble (Zürich), Moscow Contemporary Music Ensemble, Studio of New Music (Moscow), CNMRG computer and new music research group (St.Petersburg)
Tchirkov has been a guest lecturer at the Zürich University of Music and Theatre, Norwegian Academy of Music Oslo, Gothenburg University, EMS Stockholm, Conservatory of Geneva, Kuopio conservatory, Perm State Pedagogical University, and the Kazakh National University of Arts Astana. He has been an adjudicator at several compositon and new music competitions. His thesis on John Palmer’s DRANG for accordion solo has been recommended as an education tool for higher schools of music. He is an expert of the Pro Arte Foundation music programs and a member of the expert council of the St. Petersburg Contemporary Music Centre ‘ReMusik.org’. He is editor of the website dedicated to contemporary music of Switzerland and serves as the curator of the Alpenfest Project 2014 – a large scale festival of swiss music in Moscow.
In 1999 – 2001 Sergej Tchirkov coordinated AWW East European News for Accordion. In 2009 – 2010 he worked as deputy-director of the State Russian Concert Orchestra, St.Petersburg
Since 2011 he has taught at the International New Music Academy organised by the Moscow Contemporary Music Ensemble in the town of Tchaikovsky.
Sergej Tchirkov works as deputy artistic director of the Studio for New Music ensemble as well as lecturer and performer at the Centre of Contemporary Music at Moscow State Tchaikovsky Conservatory.