About
Winner of numerous awards including 1st Prize at the Brest Chopin Competition, 1st Prize at the Halina Czerny-Stefanská International Competition in Poznań (Poland) and 1st Prize at the Concurso Internacional de Piano de Vigo (Spain), Diana Cooper has been invited to perform in various venues and festivals in France and abroad, including the Nohant Chopin Festival, the Festival Chopin à Paris, the Salle Cortot, the Polish Embassy in Paris, the Ysaye Festival in Belgium, the Palacio de Congresos in Huesca (Spain), the Hrvatski dom Split in Croatia, the Kielce Filharmonia in Poland, at the Teatro Filarmónica de Oviedo…
In 2023 and 2024, she was selected to take part in the project Un été en France avec Gautier Capuçon, for which she performed solo and chamber music in several open-air concerts across France.
She was invited in 2018 to take part in the radio program Générations Jeunes Interprètes on France Musique and, in 2023, performed as a trio in the television programme Fauteuils d’orchestre, broadcast on France 5. In 2024 she was chosen to take part in a masterclass with Yuja Wang, filmed and produced by the BBC for the art series Arts in Motion.
Her activity has been enriched by solo appearances with the Orchestre Symphonique du Sud Ouest, the Orchestre Appassionato in Mozart’s 20th concerto, the Orchestre des Lauréats du Conservatoire de Paris in Schumann’s concerto, performed in 2023 at the Cité de la Musique in Paris, and more recently with the Orkiestra Symfoniczna Filharmonii Kaliskiej, in Poland, performing Chopin’s 1st concerto under the baton of Maciej Kotarba.
Born in Tarbes (France) to a French-Spanish mother and a British father, she began studying piano at the Tarbes Conservatoire with Jean-Paul Cristille, whose teaching and support had a major impact on her musical development. Her first solo recital dates back to the age of 9 and at 14 she performed with orchestra Mozart’s Concerto n° 21 in France and Spain.
She was unanimously admitted at the age of 16 to the Paris Conservatoire to study with Jean-François Heisser and Marie-Josèphe Jude and graduated with a master’s degree five years later. She went on studying for three years at the Ecole Normale de Musique with the renowned professor Rena Schereshevskaya and in 2022, she was selected to join the new season of the Académie Musicale Philippe Jaroussky, where she perfected her skills with Cédric Thiberghien. That same year, she was admitted on an Artist Diploma course at the Paris Conservatoire.
Diana is currently settled in London and has just graduated from a second Artist Diploma at the Royal College of Music in London, in Norma Fisher’s class. She won 3rd Prize at the Chappell Medal Competition at RCM and has recently been selected to join the Talent Unlimited charity as well as the Kirckman Concert Society promoting young talented musicians and offering them concerts in London.
In addition, Diana has been a regular participant in the Oxford Piano Academy and Festival as well as the Académie Maurice Ravel (Saint Jean-de-Luz), for which she won the Rotary-Lions prize and the Ysaye Festival prize in Belgium.
Throughout her studies, she has benefited from the advice of renowned pianists such as Prisca Benoît, Jonas Vitaud, Pascal Amoyel, Menahem Pressler, Gary Graffman, Ferenc Rados, Christoffer Elton, Jean-Claude Pennetier, and Andrzej Jasiński.
Following her pre-selection in 2021 for the prestigious Chopin Competition in Warsaw, she was invited the following summers by Philippe Giusiano to take part in masterclasses in Katowice as well as concerts at the Chopin Manor in Duszniki, organised by the Chopin Foundation.
She has been generously supported throughout the years by the Fondation de la Banque Populaire, the Fondation Safran and the Kathleen Trust.
Diana has recently recorded her first CD, featuring works by Haydn, Chopin and Ravel, after winning 1st Prize in the Concours d’aide aux Jeunes Artistes organised by the Festival du Vexin.
