The two young prodigies from Russia who perform Feb. 14 at the Napa Valley Opera House are among the winners of the Guzik Foundation Award, which earns them prizes and showcase performances in San Francisco, Moscow, Carnegie Hall and the Louvre.

Six of these winners are performing in the Bay Area this season with the Pacific Chamber Symphony and Chamber Music San Francisco.

“Their stories are compelling, and their music will break your heart,” said Daniel Levenstein of Chamber Music San Francisco. “They have not only trained rigorously from early childhood, but are also nourished from the deep well of the Russian musical soul.”

Children competing in this program often come from single-parent households living in poverty. Achievement in music remains an enduring Russian tradition and parents sacrifice whatever is necessary to nuture their child’s ability. The talented youngsters respond with zeal, inspired doubly by the music and the resolves of their families.

The Guzik Foundation’s innovative scholarship program is funded by Bay Area resident Nahum Guzik, a high-tech pioneer and Russian immigrant.

Every year, music schools throughout Russia groom their finest students to compete for Guzik scholarships. A brilliant field of young virtuosi is narrowed to 100 (each of whom receives a $1,000 scholarship grant), then to 40, and finally to an elite handful of musical champions.

Two of the six Guzik winners, Dinara Nadzhafova and Ilya Petrov, will perform in Napa. Their appearances with the Pacific Chamber Symphony kicks off a national tour; after the Bay Area, they  perform in Chicago, New York, Boston, Miami and Houston.

“Ilya and Dinara are the very essence of the romantic Russian soul: fiery, passionate, virtuosic and compelling,” said Maestro Lawrence Kohl, founding music director of the Pacific Chamber Symphony.

Nadzhafova was born in Kharkov in 1989, and began music lessons at age 5. Ilya Petrov was born in 1985 in Krivoy Rog, Ukraine, into a family of musicians.

The Pacific Chamber Symphony February 2007 concert series, “A Garden of Delights,” features Petrov performing as a soloist on Prokofiev’s “Piano Concerto #3.” Rachmaninoff’s “Rhapsody on the Theme of Paganini” features Nadzhafova as soloist. The concert also includes Beethoven’s “Leonore Overture No. 3,” and Brahms’ “Variation on the Theme of Haydn.”

‘A Garden of Delights’

Pacific Chamber Symphony

Napa Valley Opera House

Wednesday, Feb. 14, 8 p.m.

Tickets: $30 and $35

Reservations: 226-7372 or nvoh.org