Alma Shapiro

Alma Shapiro

Alma Esther Shapiro, born in 2004 and based in Jerusalem, began piano studies at the age of five with Mrs. Anat Paul and Mrs. Adela Umansky. She is currently in her forth year of a Bachelor’s degree in Performance at the Buchmann–Mehta School of Music, Tel Aviv University, under the guidance of Prof. Tomer Lev. Since the age of eleven, she has been a participant in the Young Pianists Program at the Jerusalem Music Center, and from sixteen to eighteen she studied in the advanced piano program led by Maestro Murray Perahia. She was a member of the David Goldman Chamber Music Program for outstanding young musicians (2017–2022) and studied music theory with Dr. Aline Gabbay. Shapiro has participated in masterclasses with distinguished artists including Maestro Murray Perahia, Prof. Boris Berman, Prof. Björn Lehmann, Prof. Milana Chernyavska, Prof. Franck Braley, Prof. Markus Groh, Emanuel Krasovsky, Prof. Pascal Nemirovski, Prof. Michael Wladkowski, Ms. Lea Agmon, and Eugen Indjic. She also attended the Edwin Fischer Summer Academy in Potsdam (2023) with Prof. Klaus Hellwig and took part in the “Verão Clássico” festival in Lisbon (2024), studying with Prof. Eldar Nebolsin.

Her achievements include first and third prizes in the national “Psanter Letamid” competition, first prize in the international “Scherzo” competition, and second prize in the Pnina Salzman Piano Competition. She has been a recipient of the America–Israel Cultural Foundation Excellence Scholarship (2016–2024), awarded on the basis of jury evaluation, and received second place in the “Verão Clássico” academy awards. Shapiro performed as soloist with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra at the age of ten, and later appeared again with the same orchestra as well as with the Ashdod Symphony Orchestra and the Academy High School Orchestra. She has given concerts and recitals in London, Italy, Moscow, Israel, Portugal, and Germany, with recordings broadcast on Israel’s classical music radio station, Kol HaMusika.