The Australian classical guitarist has won the Melbourne International Guitar Festival’s Concert Artist Competition.

Callum Henshaw has been awarded first place in the Melbourne International Guitar Festival’s Concert Artist Competition. The prize includes a nine-concert tour around Australia in 2018 and $1000 cash.

^{Callum Henshaw. Photograph supplied}

The Competition is part of the Melbourne International Guitar Festival (MIGF), run by the Mebourne Guitar Foundation. Now in its third year, the 2017 Festival took place in Melba Hall at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music last weekend. Since its debut in 2015, the Festival has grown to include concerts artists and competitors from all over the world. Performers this year included Italian classical guitarist Lorenzo Micheli, Australian flamenco guitarists Gerard Mapstone and Richard Tedsco, Andrew Blanch – the winner of the 2016 Competition – and the Melbourne Guitar Quartet.

Each year the MIGF hosts a competition open to all ages and abilities, with Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced and Concert Artist categories. Henshaw won the first prize in the main Concert Artist category, performing a programme of music by Agustín Barrios from Paraguay, Miguel Llobet from Spain and part of a recent work by Leo...