On December 12, the sixth annual “Credit Suisse Young Artist Award” was given. According to the "Frankfurter Allgemeine", this represents a “prize for young talent that is absolutely peerless in the realm of classical music.” The winner was cellist Nicolas Altstaedt, a Heidleberg native born in 1982.

The decision of the five-member Prize Committee was unanimous. After an hour-long recital and a comprehensive interview, jurors of the “Credit Suisse Young Artist Award” voted to give the coveted honor to 27-year-old German cellist Nicolas Altstaedt. The jury was hardly alone in its enthusiasm for the highly talented up-and-coming musician. “This is a young musician who commits himself whole-heartedly to his emotions: A triumph of expressivity” wrote music critic Gerhard Rohde in the "Frankfurter Allgemeine" about Altstaedt’s most recent recitals. “His specialty is a kind of rapt expressiveness, which unlocks a great sense of energy from the tiniest compositional gesture.” Within a very brief period, Nicolas Altstaedt, a pupil of Boris Pergamenshikov and David Geringas, has entered into the first rank of cello virtuosos. Composer Sofia Gubaidulina has testified to his “brilliant technique, beautiful sound, outstanding feeling for form, and fine sense of phrasing” and declared: “His playing was perfect.”

Altstaedt says he would like to give the 75,000 Swiss franks that he won in connection with the “Credit Suisse the Young Artist Award”  “back to music in any form.” He suggests, for example,  investing the sum to produce a CD of music that has never been recorded before. Just as important, too, will be the appearance Altstaedt undertakes on September 17, 2010 with the Vienna Philharmonic under the direction of Gustavo Dudamel. Meanwhile, he will make his LUCERNE FESTIVAL debut four weeks before that in works of Ludwig van Beethoven, Elliott Carter, Nadia Boulanger, Astor Piazzolla.