This SOI Autumn 2026 Season, the NCPA welcomes three internationally acclaimed musicians who will bring their distinctive voice to Mumbai’s Western classical music stage.
By Beverly Pereira
The spring and autumn seasons of the Symphony Orchestra of India offer a gamut of musical treats to concertgoers in India. There is the grand sound that musicians, anywhere between 60 and 120 (sometimes even more) in number, create in harmony, such that the sum is gratifyingly greater than its parts. There is the programme, painstakingly chosen to present compositions, loved and lesser-known, both of undisputed brilliance. And then, there is the talent; conductors and soloists of international repute, invited to Mumbai often in their Indian debuts. The works they perform resonate with their technical prowess, but also their sensibilities as interpreters of music written a few years to a few centuries ago.
Some of the finest virtuosos are about to arrive as soloists for the SOI Autumn 2026 Season. Meet them here, before you hear them at the NCPA.
Annelien Van Wauwe, clarinettist
For Belgian clarinettist Annelien Van Wauwe, music has always been about connection. Whether performing Mozart with a symphony orchestra, collaborating with contemporary composers or teaching young musicians, she approaches music with curiosity, openness and a deep sense of shared experience. This August, in celebration of 20 years of the orchestra, Chief Conductor Martyn Brabbins will open the season with Van Wauwe performing Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto with the SOI, playing the basset clarinet for which the work was originally conceived.
Raised in the Flemish town of Flanders, Van Wauwe discovered the clarinet at the age of seven. “I was immediately drawn to its sound, which I thought sounded just like the human voice. I loved singing as a child and making music with others. I was also fascinated by the clarinet’s shiny keys. What I loved most was that it allowed me to play so many different styles of music and, above all, to play with others. The social aspect was a big reason for choosing the instrument,” she says. Belgium’s rich wind band culture provided fertile ground for the young musician, while regular visits to concerts with her grandmother nurtured both her love for performance and her dream of becoming a soloist.
Today, Van Wauwe stands among the distinctive clarinet players of her generation. A former BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artist, she has won several international competitions. Her 2019 debut album Belle époque with the Orchestre National de Lille and conductor Alexander Bloch received an Opus Klassik Award in 2020. She has performed across global stages including the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Frankfurt Opern and Museumorchester, Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg and Brussels Philharmonic. Equally committed to classical and contemporary repertoire, she believes that all music exists beyond time. “I treat every new score, whether old or contemporary, with great respect. I find it deeply fulfilling to understand and truly feel what the composer has written.”
It was this approach that led her to delve into historical performance practice using her period clarinets—a practice that made an impact on her artistry. “I have a collection of historical clarinet copies and love exploring Classical, Romantic and Baroque repertoire on them. It has completely changed and expanded my perspective on playing the modern clarinet,” she says. Encountering a clarinet from Mozart’s era was a revelation for the versatile artiste. “The sound was soft, mysterious and colourful with every note sounding slightly different. The instrument felt light and easy to articulate. Through my studies in historical clarinet, I learned how to phrase classical music more naturally and correctly,” she says, adding that it has influenced her playing, not only in works by Mozart but also Weber and later composers. “I could never return to the modern clarinet playing without carrying that knowledge and experience with me.”
Yet, Van Wauwe is not content simply reinterpreting masterpieces. A passionate advocate of contemporary music, she has performed works specially written for her by several composers. Recent collaborations include Belgian composer Wim Henderickx’s Sutra, a concerto for basset clarinet, electronics and orchestra inspired by yogic philosophy. The work premiered with Brabbins and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra in 2022. A certified yoga teacher, she started practising 15 years ago during her studies in Berlin. Van Wauwe credits yoga for helping her become a healthier musician, physically, mentally and emotionally. “It has strengthened my focus, resilience and overall well-being—essential for artistes living the kind of life I do.” The clarinettist offers meditation concerts with excerpts from Sutra, while guiding the audience through pranayama techniques. Moreover, at her masterclasses for musicians in Belgium every summer, students begin each day with two hours of yoga.
Other collaborations include Benjamin Attahir’s forthcoming Love is Louder, a work that pairs clarinet, orchestra and live perfumery, written for her upcoming debut at the Philharmonie de Paris with Orchestre National d’Île-de-France. The work has seven movements inspired by the colours of the rainbow, while the title references an artwork based on a phrase used during an LGBTQ+ protest. Apart from the concert platform, teaching occupies an important place in Van Wauve’s career, who is also a professor at the Royal Conservatoire The Hague.
At the NCPA, audiences will hear all the notes Mozart actually wrote, says Van Wauwe, who will perform the composer’s Clarinet Concerto on basset clarinet, which enables playing additional lower notes. “In solo performances, I love projecting over an orchestra, blending with so many extraordinary instrumental colours and experiencing the excitement of telling a large-scale musical story. Every performance also involves adapting to new conductors, musicians, halls and audiences, which keeps it alive and inspiring. I have previously worked with Maestro Brabbins in Scotland and Tokyo, and it is a great honour for me to perform in Mumbai with the SOI at the NCPA,” she says.
Bryan Cheng, cellist
In the world of classical music, few young artistes have captured global attention quite like Bryan Cheng. The Canadian-born, Berlin-based cellist has become known for musicality that combines technical brilliance with a rare emotional depth. A sold-out debut at Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall at age 14 with his older sister, the pianist Silvie Cheng, signalled the arrival of major international talent. In 2022, he became the first cellist to receive the Verbier Festival Academy’s coveted Prix Yves Paternot, while his performances with leading ensembles such as the Helsinki and Johannesburg philharmonic orchestras and the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande have further cemented his place on the classical music scene.
Cheng, inspired by his sister, attended a cello masterclass at age three and quickly found himself immersed in its expressive possibilities. His music education took him from studies with renowned cellist David Finckel to his formative years under Russian-trained pedagogue Yuri Gandelsman, who, he says, shaped both his technique and artistic outlook. Whether navigating the introspective passages of a Bach suite or the drama of a concerto, the young cellist is known for the sensitivity his work exudes and for the ease with which he enables listeners to step into intimate musical conversations. A passionate chamber musician, he frequently collaborates with fellow musicians and performs with his sister as part of Cheng2 Duo. Their piano and cello recital is also part of the season.
On his previous visit to India in 2024, Cheng worked with both Brabbins and the SOI. “It’s why I was so eager and delighted to return. I was struck not only by the level of the players individually, but also by the camaraderie between Maestro Brabbins and the musicians. These qualities gave me a comfortable platform to share my own artistry with my colleagues and Mumbai’s enthusiastic audiences.”
Since that Indian debut, Cheng’s tour schedule has continued to expand with the last two years alone taking him to five continents and 20 countries. In this time, he performed at some of the most hallowed venues and festivals, from Carnegie Hall to Wigmore Hall, Concertgebouw Amsterdam to the Verbier Festival, and with partners like Kirill Gerstein, Gidon Kremer, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, András Schiff and so on. “I am excited to travel to and play in places as far apart as Iceland, Japan, Ireland, Serbia, Estonia, Arizona, Tennessee and Kentucky,” he says, looking ahead.
As part of the SOI Autumn 2026 Season, Cheng will perform Shostakovich’s Cello Concerto No. 1. The piece, he feels, is equally impactful on both sides of the stage. Moreover, it is a work that he encountered very early on and whose sheer energy and raw emotion left him amazed. “Playing it feels like being a cog in an unrelentingly powerful and absolutely ruthless machine. It certainly reflects the oppressive and terrifying times of the Soviet regime during which it was written, and simultaneously represents the strength of the human spirit to continue creating art even during the most difficult circumstances—as Shostakovich and Rostropovich, for whom the concerto was written, both embodied. It is one of those works that requires every ounce of power and soul in one’s reserves to cross the finish line and deliver its full weight,” says Cheng.
Francesca Dego, violinist
Long before she graced the stages of the world’s leading concert halls, a violin placed in her tiny hands by her father would set her on a steady musical path. “My father [Giuliano Dego], a writer and journalist who played the violin for pleasure, was the one I inherited the passion from. He quickly realised I needed a professional teacher, but during the first years of study, he would guide me and help me practise. We used to play duets by Pleyel and Vivaldi and Bach’s double concertos,” says the Italian American violinist.
Over the past two decades, Dego has emerged as a noteworthy voice on the classical music stage, celebrated for her compelling interpretations, versatility and flawless technique. From performing with the Dallas, Houston, Detroit and Baltimore symphony orchestras to the Auckland Philharmonia, Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony and Taipei Symphony, right up to concerts with the London Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre des Champs-Élysées, Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo and George Enescu Philharmonic Orchestra, this soloist has established herself as a formidable presence on the international concert circuit.
The 2026-27 season will see her serve as Artist in Residence at the legendary Wigmore Hall and make major debuts with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, Danish National Symphony Orchestra and Singapore Symphony Orchestra. Dego’s approach to repertoire is marked by both breadth and curiosity. While she treasures the great pillars of the canon—Bach, Mozart, Beethoven and Brahms—she also remains committed to contemporary music-making. “I make sure I keep all the big concertos warm season after season, but I also learn and debut new works every year,” she says. This is perhaps what led to one of her career’s most personal projects. Feathers in Time, inspired by the poetry of her father who passed away in 2020, is an initiative with commissions to 10 leading Italian composers to create solo violin works in response to his poems. The project will culminate in a recital at Wigmore Hall next season and a recording for Chandos Records.
Among the many highlights of her career was when she was given the rare privilege of recording on Niccolò Paganini’s legendary violin, Il Cannone. “I was overwhelmed when I first played it. The sound is majestic, as smooth as velvet and as warm and dense as lava.” Her discography includes Mozart’s complete violin concertos with Roger Norrington, Paganini: 24 Caprices for Deutsche Grammophon and the Franco Abbiati Prize-winning violin concertos of Busoni and Brahms with the BBC Symphony Orchestra. A passionate chamber musician, as much as a sought-after soloist, she regularly collaborates with artistes like Jan Lisiecki, Francesco Piemontesi and Gautier Capuçon. “All music making is really chamber music,” she reflects. “The feeling of everyone breathing together and shaping time in the moment is just as special with a symphony orchestra as it is in a trio or quartet.”
Having played Beethoven’s Violin Concerto over a hundred times since her first performance at 14, she continues to discover new layers within it. Interpretation, she believes, is “a sum of experience, life and the ability to tell a story even if it isn’t our own, which is why no two performances are ever the same. As a musician, sensitivity, empathy and a sense of emotional catharsis is vital. Love, loss, grief and becoming a mother have also shaped my way of playing.”
At the NCPA, Dego will perform this famous concerto with the SOI under the baton of Italian conductor Alessandro Bonato. Days later, she will also present a recital with pianist Francesca Leonardi, her musical partner of over two decades. “I’m very proud of Italy’s musical tradition,” says the violinist. “Alessandro is a representative of this tradition, still very much alive in the young generation. We’ve known each other for quite some time but haven’t worked together yet, so this will be a lovely first occasion in Mumbai.”
This article was originally published in the July 2026 issue of ON Stage.
