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Conductor

Hakan Şensoy

Born in Istanbul. Hakan Şensoy started his violin training under the supervision of Prof. Ayhan Turan, in “Fast Training Special Violin Unit”.  Since the first recital he gave in 1984, he has participated in many orchestra concerts as soloist and conductor at the prestigious concert halls (New York Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center – Paris Louvre Auditorium, Prag Smetana & Dvorak Hall, Wien Musikverein, Milan Sala Verdi) in Italy, Albania, Switzerland, United Kingdom, France, Bulgaria, the United States, Australia, Romania, China, Japan, Finland, Greece, Latvia, Poland, Azerbaijan, Estonia, Netherlands, Singapore, Sweden, England, Croatia, Macedonia, Kosovo, Brazil, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Germany, Russia, Venezuela, Mexico, Czech Republic, Northern Cyprus and Turkey, and has given recitals.

In 1985, he was awarded the “Most Successful Young Artist of the Year” by the Istanbul Philharmonic Society and received the “Outstanding Achievement in Art” award from the hands of ITU Rector in the same year.

In September 1988, the recital gave in Istanbul AKM was taken by UNESCO to the scope of Global Education campaign, and in this concert, UNESCO from many countries were present.  In the same year, he began his education at the Royal College of Music in London to pursue his post graduate studies. He graduated from Trevor Williams’ class here.

He completed his master studies at ITU Institute of Social Sciences on Music theory, in 1992.  He is the founder of the Milli Reasürans Chamber Orchestra, the founder and the Artistic Director of Istanbul Chamber Orchestra and the Philharmonia Istanbul.

Hakan Şensoy, who participated in many radio and TV programs as producer and commentator, also pays attention to interpreting the works of our national composers. CD recordings of the artist performing the first vocalization of dozens of works, most of which are attributed to himself as a violinist and conductor, are presented with KALAN Music and AFM Records label. Şensoy, who completed his doctoral studies in 2002 at ITU Institute of Social Sciences, continued his violn studies for a while with State Artist Ayla Erduran, and famous Russian Violinist and Pedagog Victor Pikaisen.

The artist, who received his first conducting lessons from Demirhan Altuğ between 1981 and 1987, later worked with Emin Güven Yaşlıçam and attended Gianluigi Gelmetti’s conducting course in l’Accademia Musicale Chigiana di Sienna in the summer of 2003. He also participated Maestro Rengim Gökmen’s Conducting Summer Academies on 2017, 2018 as well as 2019, Izmir Turkey.   The artist, who accompanied world-renowned soloists such as Sholomo Mintz, Raphael Walfisch, Fazıl Say, Cihat Aşkın, Ryu Goto, Tedi Papavrami, Peter Jablonsky, Bruno Schneider, Gülsin Onay, Emre Elivar, Keneth Hamilton, Steven Isserlis, Adrian Brendel, Peter Jablonsky and extraordinary soloists and bands such as Terence Blanched Band, Bee Gees Band, Dreamtone & Iris Mavraki’s NEVERLAND, George Benson, George Dalaras, Alim Qasimov, Fergana Qasimova as a conductor, performed as a soloist in recitals and took part in orchestra concerts in many countries in a wide range of continents from Australian Continent to Americas.

Şensoy, who was elected as the Music Director of the Chamber Orchestra of Karşıyaka Municipality between 2015 – 2020.

As the first and only Turkish conductor on the stage at Milan Teatro alla Scala in 240 years, the artist has pointed the Artistic Director and Principle Conductor of Izmir State Symphony Orchestra since the season of 2018-2019.  Hakan Şensoy is currently a Asst.Prof. at ITU Turkish Traditonal Music State Conservatory.