Biography
Illia Ovcharenko was born in 2001 in Ukraine into a family of teachers. He started playing the piano at the age of eight in the class of Elena Sachenko. When he was twelve, he was invited to study at the most famous music school in Ukraine, the Kiev Music School in the class of Nataliia Gridneva and Andrii Lunov, where he graduated in 2018. He is now studying for his master's degree at the Hanover University of Music, Drama and Media after completing his bachelor's degree at the Buchmann-Mehta School of Music in Tel Aviv under the direction of Arie Vardi.
He has taken master classes with Daniil Trifonov, Yoheved Kaplinsky, Milana Cherni-avskaiia, Andrea Bonnata, Rena Shereshevskaia, Murray Perahia, Fabio Bidini, Pavel Nersessi-an, Boris Bloch and Aviram Reichert, among others. He is also a scholarship holder at the Music Academy in Liechtenstein, where he participates in the Academy's intensive music weeks and activities.
read more
At the age of nine, Illia won his first competition. Since 2010 he has been a laureate of more than 20 piano competitions in Ukraine, USA, Russia, Italy, France, Poland, Israel, Czech Republic etc. Among others, he won the "Michelangeli Prize" at the Eppan Piano Academy (Appiano, Italy) and the first prize at the "Prix du Piano Bern International Piano Competition" (Bern, Switzerland). He was the winner of the sixth prize at the "Busoni International Piano Competition", earned the first prize at the "Viseu International Piano Competition" in Portugal and the second prize at the "Aspen Concerto Piano Competition" at the Aspen Music Festival in Colorado. In 2019, he was the absolute winner as well as the first prize winner of the "12th International Competition for Young Pianists in Memory of Vladimir Horowitz" (WFIMC) with the EMCY prize and he won the diploma at the "Paderewski International Piano Competition" in Poland. In 2018, he won the first prize and the special prize at the "Kyiv International Piano Competition" (KYIPC). In 2017, he was a laureate and special prize winner at the "11th International Competition for Young Pianists in Memory of Arthur Rubinstein", winner of the "Junior Academy Eppan" in Italy and absolute winner of the "International Piano Competition Resonances" in Paris. He was also a laureate and winner of the special prize of the "International Competition for Young Pianists in Memory of Vladimir Horowitz" in 2016.
Illia gave his first solo recital at the age of ten at the Philharmonic Center of Ukraine. At the age of eleven, he gained his first experience of playing in an orchestra. He has since performed at Harris Hall, Harry Teague Pavilion, and Hurst Hall. As winner of the
"Honens International Piano Competition 2022," Illia has performed with the world's leading orchestras, including the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, the Calgary Philarmonic Orchestra, the Aspen Chamber Symphony Orchestra, the Hilton Head Symphony Orchestra, the National Philarmonic Orchestra of Ukraine, the Pomeranian Philarmonic Orchestra, the National Radio Orchestra of Ukraine, and the Versailles Conservatory String Orchestra, and has worked with renowned conductors such as Arie Vardi, Dmitry Sitkovetsky, Ian Hobson, John Morris Russel, Mykola Diadyura, Kai Bumann, Mykola Sukach, Benoit Girault, Volodymyr Sirenko, Volodymyr Shejko, Nicolo Giuliani, and Vitaly Protasov.
He has performed at the Arthur Rubinstein Piano Festival in Tel Aviv, the Piano Campus Festival, the D'Auvers Sur Oise Music Festival as a soloist with a chamber ensemble from the Versailles Conservatory, and at the Bern Interlaken Classics in Switzerland. In 2019, he played his debut recital at the Salle Cortot in Paris, sponsored by the Animato Music Foundation.
Illia made numerous recordings on Ukrainian radio and television and presented his first CD on National Radio of Ukraine in 2019.
He is a recipient of the Leonid Kuchma Ukraine Presidential Fund Scholarship and a member of the Ukrainian Vere Music Fund. In 2019, he received a full-session scholarship at the Aspen Music Festival. He also won first prize at the 2022 New York Piano Competition.