A former BBC New Generation Artist, Borletti-Buitoni Trust Fellowship 2012 winner, Royal Philharmonic Society 2018 Young Artist Award winner and recipient of the 2022 Leonard Bernstein Award, Sean Shibe continues to prove himself a truly original mind at the frontier of contemporary classical music. This season sees him premiere new concertos by Cassandra Miller and Oliver Leith, as well as tour Thomas Adès’s first work for a non-keyboard solo instrument. He also appears in recital at iconic venues across Europe including Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Philharmonie de Paris, Konzerthaus Wien and Wigmore Hall as he takes up the title of ECHO Rising Star. Further highlights comprise a US tour with tenor Karim Sulayman, performances with mezzo-soprano Ema Nikolovska, and the UK premiere of Francisco Coll’s Turia, for guitar and large orchestra with Delyana Lazorova and BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra.
Recent seasons have seen Shibe perform at 92NY, Southbank Centre, Konzerthaus Dortmund, Liszt Academy, Alte Oper Frankfurt, Musashino City Hall and regularly at Wigmore Hall. He has also played at numerous festivals such as Aldeburgh Festival, Heidelberger Frühling, Festspiele Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Mozartfest Würzburg and Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival.
Often praised for his original programming, Shibe’s discography continues to garner recognition from critics and audiences all over. Most recently, his latest album Broken Branches was nominated for the 2024 GRAMMY Award for Best Classical Solo Vocal Album and his solo album Lost & Found was awarded the OPUS Klassik 2023 Award for Solo Instrument, adding to his OPUS Klassik 2021 Award for Chamber Music Recording, 2019 Gramophone Concept Album of the Year Award and 2021 Gramophone Instrumental Award for softLOUD and Bach respectively. His discography continues to expand in new directions with the release of his latest album Broken Branches, a kaleidoscopic exploration of everything from seventeenth-century lute to Arabic oud in collaboration with Karim Sulayman. Shibe is currently signed to Pentatone.
Born in Edinburgh in 1992, Shibe studied at Royal Conservatoire of Scotland under Allan Neave. He studied further at Kunst-Universität Graz in Austria, in Italy under Paolo Pegoraro, and is now a Guitar Professor at Guildhall School of Music and Drama.
