Sheku Kanneh-Mason

In 2016, at the age of seventeen, British cellist Sheku Kanneh-Mason claimed victory in the BBC Young Musician of the Year contest by delivering Shostakovich’s demanding Cello Concerto No. 1, becoming the first Black artist to secure the title across its thirty-eight-year span. Raised in a Nottingham suburb, he was the third of seven siblings, each displaying remarkable musical gifts. His eldest sister Isata sparked his initial interest when she demonstrated precocious piano talent and gained entry, at eight, to the junior program of the Royal Academy of Music. He followed her example by beginning cello studies at six and, three years later, earned a scholarship to the same institution. He also became a member of Chineke, the continent’s inaugural orchestra dedicated to Black and minority-ethnic classical musicians, and, alongside Isata and violinist brother Braimah, established the Kanneh-Mason Trio, which performed on Britain’s Got Talent in 2015—an experience that later eased his transition to the more restrained broadcast format of Young Musician. Following his win, during which his interpretations invited immediate parallels to Jacqueline du Pré, Decca offered him a recording contract. The resulting 2018 debut, Inspiration, juxtaposed the Shostakovich concerto with additional classical repertoire and personal arrangements of material by Bob Marley and Leonard Cohen; it marked the first occasion a Young Musician victor’s debut reached the charts, landing at number eighteen on the U.K. pop album listing. That spring he and an accompanying orchestra supplied the music at the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle during the register signing.