The Salzburg Festival has announced the three finalists for the Herbert von Karajan Young Conductors Award.

The finalists include Christian Blex, Jakub Przybycień, and Jong-Jie Yin. They were selected from amongst eight semifinalists who spent a weekend at the Felsenreitschule with the oenm. œsterreichisches ensemble fuer neue musik and the Mozarteum Orchestra.

They will compete for the Award during the first weekend of August, and each finalist will get to lead the Camerata Salzburg alongside participants of the Young Singers Project in a concert at the Main Auditorium of the Mozarteum Foundation. Each candidate will present a program of their choice. Przybycień will present the first concert on August 1, 2025, while Yin will get the second concert a day later. The last concert will be led by Blex.

Following the third concert, the winner will be announced by a jury that features Gary Hanson, former managing director of the Cleveland Orchestra; Axel Hiller, designated director of concerts and media at the Salzburg Festival; Markus Hinterhäuser, artistic director of the Salzburg Festival; Alexander Meraviglia-Crivelli, artistic director of the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester; Tobias Niederschlag, director of the concert office, Gewandhaus Leipzig; Pamela Rosenberg, former artistic director of the Berlin Philharmonic; and Florian Wiegand, director of concerts and media of the Salzburg Festival. The winner will get a 15,000 euro cash prize as well as an opportunity to conduct a concert with the ORF Radio Symphony Orchestra Vienna and a rising young soloist as part of the 2026 Salzburg Festival. The winner’s concert will also be released on CD as part of the Salzburg Festival Documents edition.

Blex is currently the assistant conductor of the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester and has won the Siemens Conductors Scholarship. He has assisted Kirill Petrenko at the Berlin Philharmonic and has also worked with such conductors as Daniel Barenboim, Gustavo Dudamel, Daniel Harding, Jakub Hrůša, Daniele Gatti, Alan Gilbert, Hannu Lintu, Ingo Metzmacher, Kent Nagano, Sakari Oramo, Tugan Sokhiev and Christian Thielemann.

Przybycień is the assistant conductor of the Orquestra Simfònica de Barcelona i Nacional de Catalunya and the chief conductor of the Zürcher Orchester Sozietät. His résumé has seen him work with such ensembles as the London Symphony Orchestra, the Balthasar Neumann Orchestra, the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra, Musikkollegium Winterthur, and the Arthur Rubinstein Philharmonic in Łódź.

Yin has been a guest conductor with all the major orchestras in China and has been the assistant conductor of the China National Symphony Orchestra.

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