James Vaughen, trumpet

James Vaughen, from Champaign, Ill., entered the Curtis Institute of Music in 2018 and studies trumpet with David Bilger. All students at Curtis receive merit-based, full-tuition scholarships, and James is the Stanley and Bertha Rogasner Fellow.

James has soloed with the East Central Illinois Youth Orchestra, the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra, and the University of Illinois Sinfonia da Camera. In 2018 James was chosen to attend the Pacific Music Festival in Japan, performing in Tokyo, Hiroshima, and throughout Sapporo. James has placed first in numerous national and international competitions, most notably taking first in all three divisions in the 2021 International Trumpet Guild Ryan Anthony Memorial Competition’s Solo, Orchestral Excerpts, and Wind Band divisions and winning the 2020 Roger Voisin Memorial Trumpet Competition.

Most recently James placed 3rd in the 2021 Ellsworth-Smith International Trumpet Competition, was a 2021 Tanglewood Music Center fellow, spent 4 months on tour with Canadian Brass, and just arrived back from a principal trumpet trial period with the London Symphony.

James began studying the piano at age six and the trumpet at age ten. His other teachers have included Thomas Rolfs, Ronald Romm, Nathan Mandel, Sal Percoco, and Aaron Romm.  Prior to his studies at Curtis, James spent a year working as an AmeriCorps Intern for Spring Initiative, a nonprofit transformative after-school program in the Mississippi Delta.