Turkish violinist Deniz Şensoy was named one of Classic FM’s Rising Stars of 2024, awarded the 2024/25 London Symphony Orchestra Conservatoire Scholarship, and selected as a Britten Pears Young Artist. She has received the ‘Future’s Women Stars’ Prize from the Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts, and the title of ‘Glowing Star of the Year’ from İş Bank. She made her Wigmore Hall debut in 2023, to which she now returns annually.
Deniz performed as soloist alongside Maxim Vengerov at the Royal Albert Hall with the Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra, with whom she holds a two-year Fellowship beginning in 2025 under the mentorship of Marios Papadopoulos. As a member of the LGT Young Soloists, the world’s most touring youth ensemble, she has appeared as a soloist at the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Beethoven-Haus Bonn, Philharmonie Luxembourg and Melbourne Recital Hall, continuing to tour internationally with the ensemble. She made her orchestral solo debut at the age of eight with the Çukurova State Symphony Orchestra and has since performed with the Bilkent Symphony Orchestra, İzmir State Symphony Orchestra, Olten Philharmonic Orchestra, among many others. She has also collaborated with Classic FM on a video recording for International Women’s Day at Southbank Centre in London.
She has worked with distinguished violinists including Anne-Sophie Mutter, Maxim Vengerov, Midori Goto, Alina Ibragimova, Dora Schwarzberg, Kolja Blacher, Igor Ozim and Esther Yoo, as well as quartets such as the Brodsky Quartet, Quartetto di Cremona, Sacconi Quartet, and Marmen Quartet, through her ensemble, the Fiora Quartet, where she plays first violin. She continues to receive mentorship from the LSO Concertmaster Benjamin Marquise Gilmore as part of the LSO Conservatoire Scholarship scheme.
Deniz was awarded the prestigious Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother Scholarship to complete her Bachelor’s degree at the Royal College of Music, London. She now pursues her Master’s studies with Alexander Gilman at RCM, where she is supported by a full ABRSM scholarship. She has been selected as a Philip Carne Junior Fellow and will continue her studies on the Artist Diploma programme at RCM from September 2026. She currently plays a Giuseppe Guarneri del Gesù violin (Cremona, 1732), generously loaned by a private foundation, and a Benjamin Banks violin (Salisbury, 1775), kindly loaned by Florian Leonhard Fine Violins. Her studies are also supported by the Contemporary Educational Foundation of Turkey (CEV) and MESA Holding.
