Helen Bradach Zuponcic Concerto Competition 2026

The third annual Helen Bradach Zuponcic Concerto Competition gives participants in the Young Artists program the opportunity to compete for a chance to appear in concert with the Northern Lights Music Festival Orchestra, along with cash awards.

Helen Bradach Zuponcic (b. 1915, d. 2014) was a piano teacher who taught hundreds of young people in the city of Aurora. She accepted her first student in 1945, and taught for 70 years, until her retirement in 2005 at age 90.

The Northern Lights Music Festival offers lovers of classical music three weeks of opera, chamber music and orchestra concerts presented by an international roster of guest artists, performing faculty and prize-winning young artists. The festival runs July 1-21; the full schedule is available at northernlightsmusic.org.