Matthew Hakkarainen

Recently appointed Associate Concertmaster of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Matthew Hakkarainen is the first American violinist to win first prize at the Premio Rodolfo Lipizer International Violin Competition, where he also received three special prizes. He attended the Curtis Institute of Music (BM ‘22) and the Juilliard School (MM ‘24), studying with Pamela Frank, Sylvia Rosenberg, and Ronald Copes. Matthew is currently a 2024-25 Rebanks Family Fellow at the Glenn Gould School in Toronto, where he works closely with Barry Shiffman.

Matthew was recently awarded third prize at the Stuttgart International Violin Competition and third prize ex æquo at the Ysaÿe International Music Competition. He also won the second prize, audience prize, and contemporary piece prize at the Mirecourt International Violin Competition, and won grand prize in the Adelphi Orchestra Young Artist Competition. Matthew performed as a soloist with Michael Tilson Thomas and the New World Symphony as the winner of their Concerto Competition in 2018, and he also won the Aspen Music Festival’s Violin Competition, performing the Sibelius Violin Concerto with the Aspen Conducting Academy Orchestra in 2022. In the summer of 2023, he received first prize ex æquo in the Prix Ravel at the Fontainebleau Schools of Music and Fine Arts with his performance of Ravel’s Tzigane, and this past summer, he was a recipient of the Oleg Kagan Memorial Fund Scholarship at the Kuhmo Chamber Music Courses in Finland, where he worked with Finnish violinist Elina Vähälä. Matthew has performed as a soloist with orchestras including the Stuttgarter Philharmoniker, Orchestra Sinfonica Bulgaria Classic di Plovdiv, Orchestre de l’Opéra national de Lorraine, Baton Rouge Symphony Orchestra, Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra, Acadiana Symphony Orchestra, New River Orchestra, Alhambra Orchestra, and others. He has served as Concertmaster of the Juilliard Orchestra and the Curtis Symphony Orchestra, the latter for which he recorded the violin solos from Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade, and he has played as a substitute violinist with the New York Philharmonic.