Kinan Azmeh

Syrian clarinetist and composer mostly for classical but also electro-acoustic music. Born 1976 in Damascus, Kinan was the first Arab to win the premier prize at the 1997 Nicolai Rubinstein International Competition, Moscow. A graduate of New York's Juilliard school as a student of Charles Neidich, and of both the Damascus High institute of Music where he studied with Shukry Sahwki, Nicolay Viovanof and Anatoly Moratof, and Damascus University’s School of Electrical Engineering, Kinan is currently (as of 2014) finishing his doctoral work at the City University of New York.