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James Vaughen
In addition to his orchestral work, Vaughen is an accomplished recital performer. He took first
prize in all three divisions of the 2021 International Trumpet Guild Ryan Anthony Memorial
Competition and won the 2020 Roger Voisin Memorial Trumpet Competition. He placed third
in the 2021 Ellsworth-Smith International Trumpet Competition and was awarded Special Jury
Prize at the 2022 Maurice Andre International Trumpet Competition.
Vaughen performed across four continents with Carnegie Hall’s National Youth Orchestra from
2015 through 2017 and was a member of the Pacific Music Festival Academy in 2018 and a
Tanglewood Music Center Fellow in 2020 and 2021.
He began playing piano at age 6 and trumpet at age 10 and in his freshman year of high school
was admitted to the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra. After graduating, he took a gap year to
work as an AmeriCorps teacher in the Mississippi Delta, an experience he described as both
“emotionally taxing and also very emotionally fulfilling.” His subsequent instruction at the
Curtis Institute of Music partially coincided with the pandemic, and he spent nearly three
semesters at home. “Luckily, I had a teacher who was really good at transitioning to online
learning,” he shared in an interview with Illinois Public Media. He also made the most of his
time at home by performing alongside his mother, a pianist. “She was such an important
musical figure in my upbringing,” he said.
His other teachers include David Bilger, Tom Rolfs, Ronald Room and Sal Percoco. His non-
musical interests include cooking, running, and playing soccer and tennis.
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